Page:Landscape Painting by Birge Harrison.djvu/198

LANDSCAPE PAINTING It would, however, be absurd to assert that because the convention of the Gobelins, the Beauvais, and the Arras was beautiful and soul-satisfying, it must necessarily be the ultima thule of decorative art. It was simply one good form out of hundreds, many of which are yet to be discovered. The color-schemes that could be utilized for this purpose are simply unlimited in number, and when the demand arises it is almost certain that another convention equally beautiful, though different, will appear right here in our own country. The new conditions of life in this new civilization make it impossible that our American scheme of decoration, when it is finally evolved, should be the same as that which grew out of the life and the conditions of mediæval Europe.

Those of our artists who are foolishly occupied in copying or transposing the [152]