Page:Landscape Painting by Birge Harrison.djvu/157

PIGMENTS sound and enduring; but then neither is essential. Now, with this list of twenty or thirty pigments to select from, the question arises, naturally, as to the choice we shall make from them; for it is evident, I think, that even the most courageous amateur would hardly venture upon the whole gamut at one time. In the first place, it may be said that choice of palette is a matter of temperament. Each student must experiment with the various pigments and select those which he personally finds most sympathetic. But, in general, it is best to eliminate all the secondary or compound colors, such as green, purple, etc.; and this for two reasons: first, because a painter secures more vibration in his work by mixing his own secondary and tertiary tones; and, second, because if one has a green on [117]