The Painter in oil

Key. - The key, then, is an important part of the picture. The very terms warm and
cold applied to colors suggest what may be done by color arrangement. The pitch of the
picture places it, in the emotional scale.
Tone. - Tone is harmony; the perfect balance of color in all parts of the picture. Fine
color always means the presence, in all the color of the picture, of all the three primaries
in greater or less proportion. Leave one color out in some proportion, and you have just
so much less of a balance.
I do not mean that some touch may not be pure color. On the contrary, the whole
picture may be built up of touches of pure color. But the balance of color must be made
then by touches of the different colors balancing each other, not only all over the picture,
but in each part of it, to avoid crudity or over-proportion of any color. Generally the
color scheme is dominated by some one color: which means that every touch of color on
the canvas is modified to some extent by the presence of that color, keeping the whole in
key. Each color retains its personal quality, but the quality of the dominant color is felt
in it.
False Tone. - This is not to be attained by painting the picture regardless of color
relations, and then glazing or scumbling some color allover the whole. This is the false
tone of some of the older historical painters, particularly of the English school of the
earlier part of this century. They “ painted” the picture, and then just before exhibiting it
“toned” it by glazing it allover with a large brush and some transparent pigment,
generally bitumen. This did, in fact, bring the picture in tone after a fashion. But it is not
a colorist’s method. It is the rule of thumb method of a false technique and a vicious
color sense. True tone is not something put onto the picture after I it is painted. It is an
inherent part of its color conception, and is worked into it while the picture is being
painted, and grows to perfection with the growth of the picture. It is of the very essence
of the picture. It is the dominant balance of color qualities; the result of a perfect
appreciation of the value of every color spot which goes to the expression of the artist’s
thought.
In one sense it is the same as atmosphere in that the tonality of the picture is the
atmosphere which pervades it. It may perhaps be best described by saying that it is that
combination of color which gives to the picture the effect of every object and part in it
having been seen under, the same conditions of atmosphere; having been seen at the
same time, with the same modification, and with the same degree and quality of light
vibration. Tone is color value as distinguished from value as degree of power as light and
shade; and in this is the perfection of subtlety of color feeling.
Tone Painter and Colorist. - Some painters have been called “tone painters,” while
others have been called “colorists; “ not that tone painters are not colorists, but that
there is a difference. It is a difference of aim, a difference of desire. Those painters who
are usually called colorists, like Titian and Rubens, are in love with the richness and
power of the color gamut. They are full of the splendor of color. They paint in full key,
however balanced the canvas. Each note of color tells for its full power.
Their stop is the open diapason, and their harmony is the harmony of large intervals and
full chords.