Schopenhauer believed that art frees men from any earthly chains. So last week, namely to test this philosophy (but also to free ourselves from the academic burden of exam term for a time), my friends and I visited Kettle’s Yard. It was not the first time we had visited Kettle’s Yard, yet that day we felt a particular urge to observe artworks more closely and to discuss how we felt after observing them. We concentrated on three paintings and three sculptures. The debate that emerged from this was about which artform was the best between paintings or sculptures. If art truly frees men from earthly chains, which one does it better?

Our debate on painting against sculpture was certainly not pioneering. Even during the Renaissance, this lively debate was going on, named “Paragone” at that time, by Italian artists and scholars. From this point of view, Michelangelo and Leonardo were not only the protagonists of a heated artistic rivalry but also the contenders of two sides of this debate. They did not discredit the other artform, but they definitely believed that one was better.

Michelangelo argued that sculpture was the best of all arts because it allowed the artist to cleanse the stone block of excessive material. To him, sculpture was a process of trimming down the matter and transforming it into precision and perfection. He perceived the removal of extra material as a refining and sophisticated process. When comparing it with painting, he believed the latter was an art of an inferior level because it involved the constant addition of matter on the canvas, so, in a way, it was the inverse process of sculpture.

“Some of my friends argued that paintings were better because they could play more with the fabrics of reality”

On the other hand, Leonardo argued the opposite of Michelangelo. In painting, he didn’t perceive the addition of matter as an inferior process. Instead, he believed that painting was the best medium because it allows the artist to create the most similar representation of reality. To do so, artists need to converge an immense amount of rules and disciplines. For this reason, Leonardo also believed that painting led men closer to God and divine principles.

I had this in the back of my mind as I walked around Kettle’s Yard. My friends and I started by observing paintings. In Winter, Winifred Nicholson has painted a mountain landscape, where the ground fuses with the sky through delicate shades. In Brigantine with Figurehead, Alfred Wallis has depicted a ship on an agitated sea, through stronger lines and a palette of aqua greens and blacks. And last, in 1930 (Christmas Night), Ben Nicholson has portrayed a room with a mirror and some items lying on a table; there is a big window occupying most of the space, through which a church and an animal, potentially a deer, is shown.

The more we observed these paintings, the more details emerged from each of them, such as the withered tree in Winter, the sail threads in Brigantine with Figurehead, and Ben Nicholson’s initials on the small table’s items in 1930 (Christmas Night). The three artworks were different in makers, methods, and subject matter. And yet, regardless of discrepancies, we agreed that all three of them conveyed a sense of delicateness, a dream-like environment where reality fuses with dreamscape. We initially assumed that it was the artform, painting, that made it possible to feel lightness and simplicity so vividly.

“Others said that sculpture was more effective because it played with depth, patterns, and dimensions”

However, we felt the same impression of dreaminess, of figures floating in the air while claiming their own space, in the three sculptures we observed: Dance by Henri-Gaudier Brzeska, Moondances by John Smith, and Three Personages by Barbara Hepworth. Brezka’s dancer moves freely with bent legs and arms up in the air. The dancer looks light and impalpable, her slender body and looks pliable and flexible, even though it is made of bronze. Smith’s Moondancers look whimsical and magical; their physical disproportion is so different from real human anatomy that it makes them seem almost extraterrestrial in their large tutus, mighty shoulders, and small heads. And finally, Hepword’s Three Personages are abstract solid figures; they are even in their shape and width, but also dissimilar in their position, creating a dynamic of parallelisms and movement.

These sculptures were equally absorbing and compelling. When discussing them, my friends and I instinctively compared the paintings against the sculptures to understand which of the media was more impactful. If, ultimately, they all conveyed a sense of lightness and evanescence, what made one better than the other? Some of my friends argued that paintings were better because they could play more with the fabrics of reality, portraying what sculpture rarely made credible. Others said that sculpture was more effective because it played with depth, patterns, and dimensions in a more material and tangible way than paintings. But the truth is that this question has survived for centuries without a definitive answer, and it has teased even the most famous and influential artists.

Reflecting on this, I wonder if Michelangelo’s and Leonardo’s arguments would still play today. After all, sculptors do not always remove material anymore, as some make theirs out of clay, and painters do not always calculate their compositions and representations of reality, as they work more abstractly or impressionistically. For instance, Barbara Hepworth’s sculpture is an assembly of pieces, and Ben Nicholson’s painting shows instinctive perspective and technique. Perhaps the “Paragone” still exists, but in another form, where the predominance of one art form over another depends exclusively on our artistic preference. It is really up to us to decide which we prefer.