Junichiro Tanizaki on how to make gold leaf be exquisitely beautiful

    Dark shadows and a light ray, Junichiro Tanizaki tells:

And surely you have seen, in the darkness of the innermost rooms of these huge buildings, to which sunlight never penetrates, how the gold leaf of a sliding door or screen will pick up a distant glimmer from the garden, then suddenly send forth an ethereal glow, a faint golden light cast into the enveloping darkness, like the glow upon the horizon at sunset. In no other setting is gold quite so exquisitely beautiful. You walk past, turning to look again, and yet again; and as you move away the golden surface of the paper glows ever more deeply, changing not in a flash, but growing slowly, steadily brighter, like color rising in the face of a giant. Or again you may find that the gold dust of the background, which until that moment had only a dull, sleepy luster, will, as you move past, suddenly gleam forth as if it had burst into flame.

    (Quoted from "In Praise of Shadows," by Junichiro Tanizaki. Page 348 in The Art of the Personal Essay, by Phillip Lopate. Anchor Books, 1994.)
    For a brief biography of Junichiro Tanizaki, click here. For images of or relating to Junichiro Tanizaki, click here.
    For information about Phillip Lopate, click here.