portrait of the Renaissance, when the human
form counted only as a rack on which was heaped crinoline
and stiff brocades and chains and gems and wigs and every
manner of elaborate adornment, making mountains of poor
tottering human forms, all but lost beneath.

[Illustration: _Vienna Hofmuseum_
_Spain-Velasquez Portrait_]

The present costuming of woman, when she treats herself as decoration,
owes much to the prophets of the "new" theatre and their colour scale.
These men have demonstrated, in an unforgettable manner, the value of
colour; the dependence of every decorative object upon background; shown
how fraught with meaning can be an uncompromising outline, and the
suggestiveness of really significant detail.

Bakst, Rheinhardt and Granville Barker have taught us the new colour
vocabulary. Gordon Craig was perhaps the first to show us the stage made
suggestive by insisting on the importance of clever lighting to produce
atmosphere and elimination of unessential objects, the argument of his
school being that the too detailed reproducing of Nature (on the stage)
acts as a check to the imagination, whereas by the judicious selection
of harmonics, the imagination is stimulated to its utmost creative
capacity. One detects this creed to-day in certain styles of home
decoration (woman's background), as well as in woman's costumes.

_Portable Backgrounds_

The staging of a recent play showed more plainly than any words, the
importance of background. In one of the scenes, beautiful, artistic
gowns in delicate shades were set off by a room with wonderful green
walls and woodwork (mignonette). Now, so long as the characters moved
about the room, they were thrown into relief most charmingly, but the
moment the women seated themselves on a very light coloured and
characterless chintz sofa, they lost their decorative value. It was
lacking in harmony and contrast. The two black sofa cushions intended
possibly to serve as background, being small, instantly disappeared
behind the seated women.

A sofa of contrasting colour, or black, would have looked better in the
room, and served as immediate background for gowns. It might have been
covered in dark chintz, a silk damask in one or several tones, or a
solid colour, since the gowns were of delicate indefinite shades.

One of the sofas did have a dark Chinese coat thrown over the back, with
the intent, no doubt, of serving as effective background, bu