Page:Landscape Painting by Birge Harrison.djvu/169

ON FRAMING PICTURES. Fortunately, there is a large range of colors at our disposal, beginning with pure silver, and going through various tints of green, yellow, and orange gold to the deep red of copper—a gamut as extended as the most demanding painter could ask.

Here it soon became apparent that the law of complementaries reigned supreme. A picture whose dominant note was pink demanded a greenish gold frame, a blue picture called for a tone of pure yellow or orange gold, while a picture whose dominant tone was golden yellow could only be well clothed in silver. Fortunately, the dominant note of most landscapes is found in the blue or blue-gray sky, and thus the pure gold frame is its ideal casing. But there are pictures—often enchanting effects—which are killed by the juxtaposition of yellow gold; and these [127]