contemporaries of Peter de Hooch and practiced before and since his time are in reality very simple. One may make two main classifications of interior views. Those in which the source of light (sky seen through glass) is visible and those in which it is not. The latter are subject to varied manipulation, the former to mere amelioration, for one cannot see much of color, or of form, with a strong light in one’s eyes. Views, of course, are outside our consideration; when a window exists to be looked out of, it is vain to compete with the interest of nature.
How the less visible the sources of light, the more visible will be the interior. Deep bays, embrasures, transepts, are devices to that end. But when the interior view involves a source of light, there is nothing for it but to make that source itself the interest as is often done with tracery, and stained glass, or to raise it high enough not to interfere unduly with visibility at the floor level, or to neutralize the asperity of the seen source by the admission of floods of cross lighting—all common practices in pre-reformation parish churches in England.
(To be continued)
Ladies Committee Room, St. Elizabeth’s Hospital, Harlem