William-Adolphe Bouguereau (1825–1905)Nymphs and Satyr, 1873, Oil on canvas, 102 3/8 × 70 7/8 in (260 × 180 cm)
ECONOMY YIELDS EXPRESSIVE RICHES
Sufficiency of means is the idea that the work of art is strongest when it achieves its desired result in the most economical fashion possible. Each component, whether it be color, line, layering, or tone, is deployed in a fashion that allows it to simply achieve its task and no more. Often this idea involves considerable editing, the removal of extraneous material that is not germane to the success of the artwork. Unnecessary detail, overplayed drama, excessive elements, tiresome overworking, theatrical flourishes might all be jettisoned so that the primary purpose of the artwork comes to the fore.
This principle is sometimes expressed by the idea “Less is more,” a phrase first coined by the English poet Robert Browning in his poem about the Renaissance painter Andrea del Sarto (1486–1530). The opposite is true of the so-called “pompier style” academic paintings of late nineteenth-century France, where painters such as William-Adophe Bouguereau (1825–1905) and Jean-Léon Gérôme (1825–1905) indulged in a surfeit of descriptive drama and showy illusionism to the detriment of the narrative force of their paintings. Compare this to an earlier Neoclassical painting by Jacque-Louis David (1748–1825) (see Classicsm and Rennissance on page 34) where every element fulfills an exact function within the composition, or to later modernist works where nonessential description is usually stripped away.
See also: Restraint on page 156
William-Adolphe Bouguereau (1825–1905)
Nymphs and Satyr, 1873, Oil on canvas, 102 3/8 × 70 7/8 in (260 × 180 cm)
Henri Matisse (1869–1954)
La Danse, 1909, Oil on canvas, 102 1/4 × 153 9/16 in (259.7 × 390.1 cm)
Two paintings separated by thirty years address similar subject matter in very different ways. The Bouguereau is tediously rendered and over described, while the Matisse brilliantly reduces the subject to its essence.
