THEIR- TECHNIQUE AND; HISfORY BY- EMIL-H-RICHTER ¦Y^LH»¥]MiI¥EIESfl!nf- THE WHISTLER COLLECTION Given by HOWARD MANSFIELD, 1871 1931 This book was digitized by Microsoft Corporation in cooperation with Yale University Library, 2008. You may not reproduce this digitized copy of the book for any purpose other than for scholarship, research, educational, or, in limited quantity, personal use. You may not distribute or provide access to this digitized copy (or modified or partial versions of it) for commercial purposes. PRINTS A BRIEF REVIEW OF THEIR TECHNIQUE AND HISTORY HERODOTUS. VENICE, I494 COPYRIGHT, 1914, DY HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY ALL RIGHTS RESERVED Published November IQ14 PREFACE Prints have long been an undisturbed domain of the collector and scholarly con noisseur. Centuries of study and research are resulting in the identification and de scription of this vast amount of material. The literature on prints embodies these results in the form of handbooks, histories, catalogues for reference, essays, and special izing treatises. These are written primarily for the use of students and collectors, with the elaboration and detail requisite for this class of readers. Manifestations of a widening interest are more evident every day. With this broaden ing popular interest has come a demand for a plain, short explanation of "prints." In the absence of such a brief review and in answer to repeated inquiries, a series of lec tures were prepared and delivered — some PREFACE years ago — by the writer. These lectures are herewith offered, in slightly revised form, to those interested in the nature and development of prints. This little book is not a compendium of the graphic arts, just an introduction. Brev ity and simplicity have been aimed at, the purpose being to awaken interest and con vey initial information conducive to further study. The charm and value of a print lies essen tially in the quality of line or tone peculiar to the process employed in its making. These cannot be rendered adequately by the half tone illustrations which accompany these pages. The prints themselves must be seen to be truly appreciated and understood. CONTENTS I. How Prints are Made .... 1 Introductory, 1. Bank note and magazine illustration, 3. Three main divisions of processes. Woodcut, 4. Wood-engraving, 5. Engraving, 6. Dry-point, mezzotint, 8. Etching, 9. Litho graphy, 10. The printing presses used, 11. II. The Origin of Woodcut ... 12 Not a sudden invention, 12. Utilitarian ori gin, 14. The past reviewed, 15. The panel picture and its cheap substitute, 18. Saints' pictures, 20. Playing cards, 21. Increasing demand for pictures, 24. Block-books, movable type, 26. Book illustration in Germany and Italy, 28. Examples of early woodcuts : German, 30, Italian, 32. III. The Early Days of Engraving . 35 Intaglio printing, the goldsmith's niello, 35. Engraving in Germany and Italy, attitude and results, 37. Anonymous masters, 40. Schongauer, 41. Early Italian examples, 44. Pol- lajuolo, Mantegna, 46. Giulio Campagnola, 47. IV. Italy 49 The professional engraver, 49. Marcantonio Raimondi, 50. The publisher, 51. Revival ; Carracci, 52. Painter-etchers, 53. Later develop ments; Canaletto, 55. The classical engravers, 55. Chiaroscuro woodcut, 56. vii CONTENTS V. Germany 59 Culmination, Dttrer, 60. Lucas van Leyden, 65. Italian influence, 66. Little masters, 67. Woodcut : Cranach, Holbein, 69. The two masters, Diirer and Holbein, 70. Decline, 71. VI. The Netherlands 73 History. Flemish and Dutch art, 73. Engraver families, commerce in Saints' pictures, 75. Virtuosi of the graver, Goltzius, 76. Rubens and his engravers, 77. Van Dyck, 78. Cornel Visscher, 79. Rembrandt, 80. Ostade, 84. Ruys- dael. Landscape and animal etchers, 85. Italian influence, decline, 86. VII. France 87 Woodcut illustrations, 87. Engraving, Jean Duvet, 89. The Fontainebleau school, 90. Cal- lot, Claude Lorrain, 91. Portrait engraving, 93. Mellan, 94. Morin, 95. Nanteuil, 96. Ede- linck and others, 97. New processes, 100. Color- prints, book ornamentation, 101. Classical en graving, Wille, 104. Italian preeminence, 105. Etchers, vignettists, 105. Spain: Goya, 107. VIII. England 109 Early days, Hollar. English engravers, 109. Hogarth, 110. Bartolozzi, 110. Mezzotint en gravers, 111. Earlom, 113. Wood-engraving: Bewick, 114. IX. The United States 116 Colonial times; Pelham, Peale, 116. Stipple; book illustration, 117. Wood-engraving, the tone engravers, 118. Etching, 120. viii CONTENTS X. The Nineteenth Century . . . 121 Individual expression, 121. Blake, 122. Chodo- wiecki, 123. A new era, Constable, Delacroix and others, 124. Turner, 126. Wood-engraving and lithography, 127. Menzel ; Gavarni, Dau- mier, 129. Raffet, 130. Revival of etching, 130. Jacque, Millet, and others, 131. Etching versus Engraving, 131. Haden, Whistler, 132. Meryon, 133. Gaillard, 134. Exacting demands on the graphic arts; Zorn, Klinger, 135. Con clusion, 136. Books recommended for study of prints, 138. ILLUSTRATIONS Title-page to Herodotus. Anonymous . Title-page St. Margaret of Hungary. Anonymous . . 30 Page from Ars Memorandi. Anonymous . . 30 Page from Nuremberg Chronicle. Anonymous 30 Virgin and Child with St. John. Anonymous 32 Page from Hypnerotomachia. Anonymous . 32 Page from Morgante Maggiore. Anonymous . 32 Madonna of Einsiedeln. Anon. Master E. S. 40 Death of the Virgin. Martin Schongauer . . 42 Sibilla Samia. Anonymous 44 Clio, from the so-called Tarocchi. Anonymous 44 Battle of Nude Men. Antonio Pollajuolo . . 46 Christ between Two Saints. Andrea Mantegna 46 St. John the Baptist. Giulio Campagnola . . 46 Death of Dido. Marcantonio Raimondi . . 50 Adam and Eve. Marcantonio Raimondi . . 50 Titian. Agostino Carracci 52 Madonna and Child. Federigo Barocci . . 54 Torre di Malghera. Antonio Canale ... 56 Diogenes. Ugo da Carpi 56 Four Horsemen, Apocalypse. Albrecht Durer . 60 xi ILLUSTRATIONS Arms with the Skull. Albrecht Diirer Rest in Egypt. Albrecht Diirer St. Jerome in his Study. Albrecht Diirer Cardinal Albrecht. Albrecht Durer . Adoration of the Magi. Lucas van Leyden Tournament. Lucas Cranach Johannes Zurenus. Hendrik Goltzius Rubens. Paul Pontius .... Jan Brueghel. Anthony van Dyck . Gellius de Bouma. Cornel Visscher Adoration of the Shepherds. Rembrandt The Three Trees. Rembrandt . Janus Lutma. Rembrandt . Tobit Blind. Rembrandt . The Spinner. Adriaen van Ostade The Travelers. Jacob Ruysdael The Diamond. Nicolaes Berghem Tour de Nesle. Jacques Callot Le Bouvier. Claude Lorrain Due de Guise. Claude Mellan . Antoine Vitre. Jean Morin Pompone de Bellievre. Robert Nanteuil Philippe de Champaigne. Gerard Edelinck Bossuet. Pierre Imbert Drevet . Champs Elysees. Nicolas Henri Tardieu xii ILLUSTRATIONS Instruction Paternelle. Georg Wille . . 104 Plate from the Caprichos. Francisco Goya . 106 Catharine of Braganza. William Faithome . 110 The Hon. Miss Bingham. Francesco Bartolozzi 110 Mrs. Carnac. John Raphael Smith .... 112 Flower and Fruit Piece. Richard Earlom . 114 Thomas Jefferson. David Edwin .... 116 Chief Justice Marshall. Asher Brown Durand 118 Still-life with the Peacock. William J. Linton 118 Plate from the Book of Job. William Blake 122 Home of a Painter. Daniel Chodowiecki . . 124 Inverary Pier. J. M. W. Turner .... 126 .(Esacus and Hesperie. J. M. W. Turner . . 126 Christ Disputing with Doctors. A. v. Menzel 128 Cartoon on Louis Philippe. Honore" Daumier 128 Midnight Review. Auguste Raffet .... 130 Woman Churning. Jean Francois Millet . . 130 Sunset in Ireland. Sir Seymour Haden . . 132 The Doorway. Venice. James McN. Whistler 132 Le Petit Pont. Charles Meryon • • • .132 Dom Prosper Gueranger. Ferdinand Gaillard 134 Girl Bathing. Anders Zorn 134 Expulsion from Paradise. Max Klinger . . 134 PEINTS THEIR TECHNIQUE AND HISTORY I HOW PRINTS ARE MADE Prints are familiar to every one of us, and yet the subject of prints is strangely unfa miliar. If we look at a painting, a piece of sculpture, or at a monumental building, we know how these things came into being. Without any effort we can see in our mind's eye the painter, with palette and brushes, applying the colors on his canvas, we can see the sculptor thumbing the clay model on the stand before him, with alternate gentleness and force, while the spectacle of stone masons and bricklayers at work is a matter of daily occurrence. Likewise are we daily face to face with prints in our homes. They 1 PRINTS are familiar objects that have always been there; we are so used to them that we hardly see them. But have we ever conjured up, in our mind's eye, the vision of an engraver, or etcher, or lithographer at work making the print which is so familiar to us? It is a world, indeed, this field on which the ener gies of thousands upon thousands of men have been expended, expressive of the thoughts of great masters, expressive, yes, eloquent, of the changing mental attitude, the changing customs and interests of suc cessive periods. There is no field, I am tempted to say, in all the realm of art, more comprehensive, more broadening than this subject of prints. In order fully to appreci ate the phases of its development, we must find out, first of all, what a print is, and how it is made. The term "print," as we use it here, ap plies to any design conveyed upon paper or any similar substance by means of pressure, usually in the printing-press. Prints are not 2 HOW PRINTS ARE MADE all produced in one and the same manner; — if this statement should prove surprising, just open any magazine on an illustration page; then place beside it, for comparison, a new dollar bill. Notice the even tone of black in the magazine illustration and the intensity of the black, sharp-cut, metallic lines of the head on the bill. It is quite evi dent that these two examples have been pro duced by different means; the magazine il lustration shows that the inked lines and dots which constitute the picture have been brought upon the paper with considerable pressure : the ink is embedded into the paper ; whereas, if the bill is new, you will notice, upon close inspection, that the ink of every line and dot lies upon the surface of the pa per. Pass your finger lightly over some of the heavier lines, and if your finger-tips are sensitive, you will distinctly feel these ridges of ink. Why this difference? Because hu man ingenuity has devised several ways of obtaining an impression. There are three 3 PRINTS such possibilities, which divide the graphic arts into three main groups, namely: — Relief processes: Woodcut, wood-en graving ; Intaglio processes: Engraving, dry- point, mezzotinting, and the etching proc esses; Planographic processes: Lithography, and its derivatives.1 Examples from two of these main divi sions have just been under discussion, the magazine illustration being a relief print, the bill an engraving on steel, consequently intaglio. Let us now devote a few moments to their technical features, taking first the oldest of all the processes, woodcut. If we take a block of wood, nicely planed, finish its face with sandpaper, and cover it with printer's ink, an impression from that 1 In order to keep the subject as simple as may be, we will leave aside that vast array of modern processes based upon photography, and therefore known as photo-mechan ical processes (half-tone, photogravure, and the like) and devote our attention to the hand processes only. HOW PRINTS ARE MADE blackened surface would naturally be an unbroken, rectangular patch of black. Now we take a knife with a strong, short blade, a woodcutter's knife, and with two slanting cuts we take out a thin long sliver from the middle of this blackened surface of wood. The result of an impression will now be a black surface with a white line where we have cut away the wood. Another two cuts parallel with the first will result in another white line, or rather we shall now have a black line, with a white space on either side, the black line being the ridge of wood standing between the two pieces which we have cut away. Could anything be simpler than this working recipe? — wherever black is wanted, leave the wood standing; where you need white, cut away the wood. The same theory applies to wood-engraving, with some changes in material and implements. The wood- engraver uses cross-grain blocks of the hard boxwood, instead of planks of cherry or pear wood, and on this hard surface the graver 5 PRINTS replaces the knife. The graver — most use ful of tools — is a long, thin, diamond-shaped bar of steel, ending in a blunt point with cut ting edges; its wooden handle fitting the palm of the hand. The graver is pushed for ward and ploughs with great precision across the block or plate, cutting lines of any degree of delicacy or boldness. Like the knife, it removes the wood, consequently leaving a white line or dot wherever it has passed. Hence the term "white-line engraving," often used for wood-engraving. When we turn to the second great divi sion, to the intaglio processes, we find that the recipe of the woodcut has to be just re versed to fit this new proposition. If we consider the three possibilities of printing, the first, the relief -block, presents, as we know, a series of flat-topped ridges with valleys between them. The tops of the ridges print, the valleys are the spaces which are to appear white in the impres sion. In the second division, that of intaglio 6 HOW PRINTS ARE MADE plates, — an engraving on copper we will say, — there are no hills and vales, but a flat surface with a number of V-shaped cuts to be filled with ink. When engraving on a copper plate, we cut with the graver into the metal every line of our design that is to appear black. Wherever we want a white space we are careful to leave untouched the polished surface of the plate. Having completed the cutting -in (engraving) of our design, the plate is covered all over with printing-ink, and this is rubbed thoroughly into every fur row which we have cut, so that they are all filled flush with the surface. The surface of the plate is wiped clean. An impression taken from the plate so prepared will show us a black line for every furrow we have cut. Small wonder that the lines on the dollar bill were perceptible ridges of ink, since all the ink in the furrows of the plate is now on the surface of the paper. The theory of the intaglio processes is plainly this: wherever you want black in your design, cut lines or 7 PRINTS dots into the plate; wherever white is needed, leave the smooth surface of the plate un touched. Based upon this formula, the different intaglio processes produce their blacks in different ways; in dry-point en graving, for instance, the design is scratched into the metal by means of a sharp nee dle-point, the etching-needle. In tearing through the copper the needle leaves a jag ged ridge of copper standing on the sides of each line, this "burr" retains some ink after the plate has been wiped clean, and gives to the dry-point line its peculiar velvety, slightly blurred appearance. The mezzo- tinter begins his work by roughening the whole surface of the plate with the "rocker" into myriad indentations and tiny projecting teeth of copper. The plate in this condition prints a uniform, velvety black, the deepest tone obtainable. Now by scraping away the little teeth of copper more or less completely, the design is modeled at will in varying half-tones. The high lights are obtained by 8 HOW PRINTS ARE MADE burnishing the copper quite smooth again. The etcher, instead of cutting the lines of his design into the copper, trusts to the corrod ing action of powerful acids. Covering his plate with an acid-proof etching-ground, he draws his subject with the etching-needle, using just sufficient pressure to cut through the thin film of ground and lay bare the cop per. The plate is then put into an acid bath which eats away the metal wherever a line has been laid bare. The ground is then washed off with a suitable solvent, and the plate printed. There are a number of proc esses based on etching, like aquatint, crayon manner, stipple, soft-ground etching, and others, but a review, however brief, of all these kindred devices does not lie within the scope of these pages. We have now reviewed the relief proc esses, both dependent entirely on hand work, and the intaglio processes, engraving, dry-point, mezzotint, likewise relying upon manual power to prepare the plate for print- 9 PRINTS ing. In the etching group of intaglio de vices, a chemical factor is called upon to lessen and accelerate the work of the hand. The last group to be considered, piano- graphic processes, is based entirely upon chemical and physical action. The drawing to be reproduced is made with fatty crayon or ink upon a slab of a special variety of limestone; the stone is then treated with acidulated water, and with gummed water. As a result, when the stone is moistened, all those parts which have been drawn upon reject the water, but have an affinity for printing-ink, while the portions not drawn upon have an affinity for water and reject printing-ink, as long as they are kept moist. Neither by ridges nor sunken furrows, just from one plane surface, — hence the term "planographic," — merely by the enmity of water and fatty ink are these lithographic im pressions obtained. Plates of metal are often substituted for stone (zincography, algraphy), but the process always remains the same. 10 HOW PRINTS ARE MADE It goes without saying that each of these three possibilities of printing necessitates presses of appropriate construction; thus, in the so-called platten press, the pressure is exerted vertically upon the block by the flat metal plate which comes down upon it, on the same principle as in the letter-press famil iar to us all. All intaglio plates are printed in roller presses, in which the plate, laid on an iron bed, passes between two rollers, one above, one below, as in a clothes-wringer. The lithographic press, finally, has a travel ing bed, which passes under a stationary flat piece of wood. During its passage under this wooden bar, the paper is firmly pressed down upon the stone, which would be crushed in the other types of presses.1 After this summary review of the tech nique of prints, let us consider, with what brevity we may, the great phases of develop ment of the graphic arts. 1 Lithographs made on metal plates may be printed in an intaglio press as well. II THE ORIGIN OF WOODCUT The term "invention" is often used in referring to the origin of printing and of engraving, as though these devices had come into being quite suddenly, — overnight, as it were. The belief is prevalent, indeed, that one man in Mayence originated, developed, perfected, established printing, and that an other man in Florence originated printing from engraved plates about that same time (middle of the fifteenth century) . If we look more closely into these subjects, it becomes evident that Dame Tradition has flashed the light of fame upon one link only, of a chain of achievements which stretches back into the unknown. She has clothed one man, call him Gutenberg, call him Finiguerra, with the sum of thought and attainment which had preceded them, that the achieve ment might gain added impressiveness. 12 THE ORIGIN OF WOODCUT The printing-press, and printing from mov able type, had reached a state of high perfection at the time when Gutenberg printed his epoch-making Bibles, and re search has substantiated the belief that a period of experiment and development must have preceded and led up to such excellence, although these early days of printing still baffle the ingenuity of research. The genesis of printing from engraved plates is equally difficult to establish, though the claim of invention by any one man is as little admis sible here as in the other instance. It is a matter of gradual development. Remember, it is the printing from engraved plates which concerns us in our inquiry. Engraving as a means of decorating metal surfaces dates back to remote antiquity, but that is foreign to our present subject. Only when engraving is used as a means of reproducing a design, does it enter within our sphere of interest. Similarly are we concerned to a certain extent with the wood-block method used in 13 PRINTS the days of Byzance, for stamping patterns upon cloth, because it is the parent of our woodcut. We have here, however, a device used for the decoration of textile fabrics, and we must reserve our interest for the time when the design printed from the wood block, upon paper or any other suitable carrier of an impression, becomes the essential consid eration. The origin of the processes of reproduction is invariably utilitarian. Every advance, every new technical attainment, can be traced to the demand for devices which would lessen labor and save time. The graphic arts do not share with painting a development based upon a desire for aes thetic expression. Their origin is imitative, thoroughly democratic, and every process continues in that lowly sphere, until the genius of some powerful artist lifts it into realms of art. For the very reason of this utilitarian tendency, and because of a gamut of expression restricted to line and tone for 14 THE ORIGIN OF WOODCUT the interpretation of a world of color and form, the graphic arts, even more than other forms of artistic expression, need the steady hand of the gifted artist to sustain them on a high plane of excellence. Deprived of this guiding support, their decline to levels of mediocrity and commercialism is swift and inevitable. If we glance at early periods of history, we are readily convinced that before the fif teenth century there existed no demand for pictorial work widespread or emphatic enough to call into life speedier substitutes for hand work. Surely no need of such sub stitutes was felt in the Grseco-Roman world, where a well-developed system of scribes met the demands of their patrons. Nor were multiplying devices needed in the early days of Christianity. The new faith, to be sure, made its appeal to everybody, to the high born and lowly alike, but it relied mainly on the word of the preacher for the transmission of its simple creed. During the dark ages 15 PRINTS of ferment, migration, and strife which fol lowed, the monuments of antique culture, erudition, knowledge were engulfed. What demand could there have been for the multi plying arts in that period of dense ignorance, of ceaseless struggle for life itself, for the bare necessities of life, for merely endurable conditions? The Church, the only institu tion of stability in this sea of unrest, became the repository of whatever remained of tra dition and erudition, — mysteries, these, to be jealously guarded and held as a privilege of the clergy. Owing to the prevalent illiteracy among the people in these dark ages, the Church, in its mission of spiritual guidance, relied, as of old, on the preacher's word. The power of his exhortations was seconded, however, by silently eloquent, impressive teachings sur rounding the worshipers, namely, the scenes and figures of religious import, painted upon the walls of the church. That same endeavor to stimulate pious thoughts carried the mini- 16 THE ORIGIN OF WOODCUT ature into liturgical books, into religious manuscripts generally. The writing-room ofthe monastery was all-sufficient to provide for the pious needs of clergy, rulers, and nobles. Here the patient copyist drew again and again the outlines of the large illumi nated initials of his text, until he bethought himself of the labor he might save by imi tating the cloth-printer, and cutting wooden relief -blocks of these outlines which he might stamp upon his parchment. An early device this, adopted in the twelfth or thirteenth century, but clearly foreshadowing the de velopment which was soon to follow. Meantime, in that iron age religious en thusiasm had fired the crusaders, the armor- clad Occident had met the Orient, bringing back some of the wisdom of the ancient East into the scholar's study and the convent cell, and broadening man's outlook upon the world. We know how Gothic architecture grew up in the North, how in the Gothic church 17 PRINTS the ample wall space, which had been here tofore the realm of painting, was divided, reduced, suppressed. We know how the cur tailed pictorial art sought new spheres of expression, how the panel picture took pos session of the altars. Before long this pic ture, which could be shifted from one posi tion to another, was used independently of altars, for the adornment of suitable wall spaces in the church, until finally it found its way from the church to the home, hence forth to be one of its indispensable adorn ments. As painting made its way into the lay world, the impersonal, traditional, dogmatic character of sacred subjects faded away. Not that ecclesiastic art had lost its deeply religious sincerity, but the artist saw na ture with new eyes ; he realized the beautiful world around him, and lovingly painted the plants and flowers at the feet of the Virgin. He removed her throne from the formal dia pered background of gold, and placed it in 18 THE ORIGIN OF WOODCUT the midst of the actual living world. The figures became more personal and lifelike; worldly subjects, even portraits, or at least efforts in the direction of individual differ entiation, came within the artist's sphere, while as yet the sacred subject remained the one great theme of artistic expression. The panel picture had come into the home as a means of decoration, but the wealthy only could gratify their desire for this costly form of artistic adornment. The burgher, the artisan, the economical household, could not think of owning such painted luxury, not any more than they could afford the costly miniatures painted on parchment. Then some bethought themselves that they might cut the outline of figures on blocks of wood, after the manner of the cloth-printers and of the initial blocks which we have found in use in monastic writing-rooms. These outlines could then be printed on parchment, or on that new and cheaper product, paper, as an inexpensive substitute for panel picture and 19 PRINTS miniature. In this manner the common peo ple obtained their saints' pictures or "Hel- gen " (Heiligen) , more or less crude in design, clumsy in the execution of knife-work, col ored with the gayest pigments which the Brief maler could find. With all their imper fections these early woodcuts were prized and evidently found a ready market, as souvenirs of pilgrimages, as fit embellish ments of wayside shrines or altars of the chapels and churches of poor parishes, as scapulars, or pasted in books, as makeshifts for the unattainable miniatures, or else they were simply fastened on the wall, as a decoration. Tastes were simple, and with all their crudeness, these productions — of greatly varying size and of every degree of careful or careless execution — are not with out charm even to the twentieth-century beholder. The same artisans who cut and printed these saints' pictures found lucrative em ployment in a field quite remote from reli- 20 THE ORIGIN OF WOODCUT gious matters. Playing-cards had been intro duced into Europe from the Orient, probably in the latter part of the thirteenth century. They quickly won popular favor and were used by rich and poor with equal zest. Cards exquisitely painted or charmingly en graved attest the favor accorded the game by people of rank and wealth, but in making cards for the use of the people at large, cheapness of production far outweighed any aesthetic considerations which might have existed. Cards had to be sold cheaply, and they had to be produced in large quantities to satisfy the growing demand. How were these conditions to be met? One solution of the problem was stenciling, another stamp ing the outlines on paper by means of relief- blocks ; both were resorted to by the artisans of the fifteenth century, and their trade spread beyond the confines of Germany, to the south of the Alps, causing Venetian craftsmen to clamor for legislative protec tion of their home production. 21 PRINTS In all these early manifestations, we saw woodcut in the service of the common peo ple; we saw it used instead of other means of production for reasons purely utilitarian. But a change is at hand, for has not the cru sader sown a seed throughout the land; has not the human mind been awakened from its mediaeval lethargy? The humanist arises, seeking enlightenment and the solution of life's problems amid the meager surviving relics and records of the art and thought of antiquity. Feudal conditions are grudgingly modified, under pressure from a new element, which brings about a gradual shifting of the balance of power, intellectually as well as economically and politically: the rise of the Town. During our early, turbulent centuries with their grim " simple plan, That he shall take who has the power, And he shall keep who can," — misery not only loved company, as the old proverb has it, but absolutely needed it. THE ORIGIN OF WOODCUT Groups of those, too weak singly to with stand the attacks of that vast, lawless ele ment which lived by oppression and plunder, huddled themselves together, built them selves shelters, and intrenched themselves against the common foe. In the course of time, owing to an advantageous position or to intensity of commerce or industry, these one-time shelters grew into towns, rising in wealth, power, and independent spirit, girt about with strong walls and moats, each town a state within the state, protected by imperial grants and privileges, bound to gether by the common enmity of the feudal power, and within the walls by an ardent local patriotism. Strong in their guilds and associations, in touch with each other and with the world by the constant travel of merchants and craftsmen, the towns became not only centers of wealth, but also the bearers of progressive thought, of art, of mental enlightenment. Here the graphic arts might well originate and flourish, for here 23 PRINTS were their patrons, the burgher, the crafts man, the people. The time was at hand when the call for the multiplying arts would become imperative — compelling. Man looked about, and be held a world full of beauty and abuses; he felt himself a unit, an individual, not merely part of the mass of mankind, and he was going to think for himself; he demanded to know, to learn, to grasp the truths and probe the problems of his world. For the instruc tion of this untutored multitude, eager for light, there were two modes of expression, instantly intelligible: the simple spoken word, and that other — the illustrative, explanatory picture. This latter must now go forth also among the people, to help in the task of enlightenment; not the panel picture, to be sure, nor the miniature in the costly manuscript, for aside from their costliness they could never numerically satisfy so uni versal a demand. In response to the call — we are now in the fifteenth century — we see 24 THE ORIGIN OF WOODCUT woodcut pictures pasted into manuscripts, to form edifying picture books, the pictures printed from wood blocks, a few lines of text added with the pen. Then both picture and text are cut into the same wood block in imitation of the picture manuscripts. These early "block-books," of Biblical or moral izing contents, were intended for the use of pupils in the monastic schools which were then the only educational institutions. In the early days of woodcut, impressions were taken from the wood block by laying a sheet of paper on the inked surface of the block and rubbing the back of the paper with a stiff scrubbing brush, or with a flat piece of wood, so as to bring it in close contact with the inked ridges on the surface of the block. It is evident that neither the quality nor yet the speed of this form of printing could long satisfy even the most easy-going craftsman. A more perfect mode of printing was needed and gradually evolved, culminating in the printing-press. Similarly the cutting of let- 25 PRINTS ters of the text on the picture blocks — in the so-called block-books — must soon have proved itself impracticable, for the reign of these books is quite brief. One is tempted to let fancy play around the bald facts, and to watch the artisan, wearily cutting the same letters again and again into the wood block, until he bethinks himself, — a half - dozen others likewise: "Why cannot I saw off the lettering cut on another block, cut it up, word by word, or, better yet, letter by letter, then put the letters together in words and sentences as I need them, and use them with my newly cut picture? It would save a deal of trouble ! " Thus the next step was movable type, used around, between, together with, the blocks bearing the illustrations. The rapid spread of type-printing simultaneous with these developments concerns us merely because the vast number of illustrated books published during that period greatly favored the development of woodcut illustration. Throughout these developments, we al- 26 THE ORIGIN OF WOODCUT ways discern the same utilitarian element which I have pointed out. Far from originat ing in any striving for a higher, more ideal form of artistic expression, the devices for printing both pictures and text were simply means to save labor and expedite publica tion. The manuscript, the miniature, were the ideals to be approached, and they were high ideals, to be sure. Distinguished hu manists like Pope Nicholas V, Poggio, Giannozzo Mannetti, and others, being themselves experts in calligraphy, demanded the best efforts of their scribes and miniatur ists. It is a pleasure merely to look at their books. The material used is invariably parchment, the bindings in the Vatican and at Urbino, crimson velvet and silver. It could hardly be expected that these men, who spared neither pains nor expense to show their respect for the contents of a book, would view the advent of printing with any thing like satisfaction. Their collective feel ings are well summed up in the one remark 27 PRINTS of Federigo da Urbino, that he would be ashamed to own a printed book. Not by these nor for their use had type- printing and picture -printing been called into life, but by the needs of the people, and at the people's call the world was flooded with a multitude of works, informative or entertaining in character. Soon German printers set up presses in Italian cities, and ere long the publishing centers of the South, especially Venice, vied with Germany in importance of production. Book illustration was considered from a very different point of view in Germany and in Italy. German illustration grew out of a demand for and pleasure in the explanatory picture. The demand for picture books and for books consisting chiefly of illustrations came from a public easily pleased, satis fied with crude outline cuts daubed over with colors. In Italy illustration came in answer to a desire for artistic illustrative ornamentation, on the part of a public of 28 THE ORIGIN OF WOODCUT cultivated taste. For this reason the Ger man illustrated book bears a character largely instructive, while the Italian illustra tion is essentially decorative. Very few of the early books in the German language are devoid of illustrations. The pictures consti tute their decoration, — they are used as chapter headings, — long before the advent of purely ornamental embellishments. In Italy the printed book takes over from the manuscript the idea of decorative embellish ment. Borders are stamped — with relief- blocks — upon the printed pages of early Venetian books, and colored by hand. This craving for color is as old as mankind; its demands are urged upon the graphic arts at all stages of their development. The demand for color caused the manuscript to be illu minated, and the pen-drawn outline of the early miniature to be filled in with pigment; we have seen its call answered in the crudely colored saint's picture. The outline is ex planatory, intellectual, the coloring adds a 29 PRINTS sensual pleasure, and this additional feature of bright color was soon demanded also of the printed book. The printer's answering endeavors are seen in the red initials printed into pages of black text, in title-page designs, arms and ornaments, in borders and dia grams printed in two, sometimes three col ors. Another effort in this direction of color is the chiaroscuro x woodcut, but that belongs to a later period. A few illustrations will convey a more definite idea of these early woodcuts. Here is a dignified, pleasing ex ample of the "Helgen," cut in outline, as usual, and colored by hand (the dark tones on the garments and elsewhere are due to this coloring). No shade-strokes are as yet introduced, merely an outline; the rest is left to the colorist. After that, inscriptions are cut into the block, or written in, and this combination of lettering and picture carries us to the block-books. A typical page from the "Ars Memo- 1 Pronounce: keearoskooro. 30 ST. MARGARET OF HUNGARY Woodcut with hand coloring ,;. ^I't -".V-.. n..l.Cn« r^^~ -=^_-. IW wm.a c ..ti ...,.,.. r_ -- block-book page Are Memorandi oer&>crIt Mat cxx-fi OX>\im6(iim lie titgbcemii(.ilitg'ril ir".n!icl)(ihnvii&g«|ih!ht^i-oii,!.l.ui^i.,o,mf.ii|;i i»ii&»ont)tgitr«tibcFb.ii&(g*fMgt.»ii& fpMffjftj ! mfJ>axrtg(nd^ffliirmq.wflo«9bno«ibcr.. i '"' H - .: nbtfwn*fchn.fKii.iH&.ewT"' ' ¦¦¦ ' - 'I-- tl tjtntiKttAuanliimAsttt'i^'mvnbflaibfiijtiwlui). )itJio[.bCTilii]bUtj|wtt! S«pbaycEljattirdif«5IurfluiiiK(wirtta6tiK{5.il[!mtit(iif(r Tvii{ni«IjfciiKiiii s.uidaiwmg£iKitt&jiin>io»Mw*ngcl.O!(rtinv r^O.Ij.:uf;t«f(b«hi|;TO^(HJi.!r.ll)«_r1^;ua^l)C-E>ir':|'''ni|Io(re(:l))\'(i:(iip:iinri|f.-T>ij;|ri;.i(frjii^,o|;>|Uv:i[(»i^babilcgiciTi.iiigviJcgcilitiviii.-!fribtj tjiimjtii _ropJw\|llKii l,..ib* b.il)nt bjri van mawgfdtiga mtgavcgiijiijd lVij.E>*rL-|I.tti|ii.iiravr]birbflrib(rr^gs« fc^ophov a«wt(i rn^ r- - h .,.- ¦ tiij)ibritiii.ing.n'.|i-».iiftitn.!ciii!iFt:wciubcicl)Hgti- Sfuiflmtocnil | '¦ ¦" ii1irtii-in.".rt.iVb£airabtTblK)KrMibct-lM!Lgcriftl)t.rTfiib(Uid>t-i. .mt i-librsl A r,l|b flf|cbicErb.w|kr"bt' bgrmvRIn cfdi: • n-ir. r :ic r'.lim.rrg Ztof-dbhitl Jegcc audi tj[jcrtjogd)iii ibbdjdbtr Mrfs ntiti lb.liKOfK.ll. n jii eiopl>ov •nbbcriinbnart t(Mf- -J --; -i_#*^ /N"TtoA\ANAE-ECCI...AE'TivSAN« CHRY50GONl;PBRCARDINA _\.tGVN-AC>MACJDE-ARCHi EPS -ELECTOR- liVYPE PRLNYAS AD Mi XI ¦ HALBER-AIAR CHI* ' . ^sS^vBRANDEXBVRGENSES S\C OCVLOJ bSICVlLLE? GENA31 'ilO't . ORAi FERE BAT 2 .Anno ETATWiVE'Jxxi'xi • JVL D p^^^^^^n CARDINAL ALBRECHT OF MAYENCE Albrecht Diirer GERMANY extreme depth the shadings have been kept; all in the range of silvery grays, which Diirer sought in preference to dark shadows. The values in the figure, the arms and the inscrip tion have all received careful consideration from this master whose genius was, indeed, the faculty of taking infinite pains. From this brief glance at the great Nurem berg artist, we must turn now to his North ern contemporary, Lucas van Leyden, like wise a painter-engraver, and a solitary figure in the Netherlands at that period. Bred in the realistic maxims of the fifteenth century, his Northern origin asserts itself in the care ful detail and truthful presentation of na ture, in the characteristic types of his figures. Truthful rendering of natural facts — as has been mentioned before — is a quality com mon to Northern artists. Diirer, in his fond ness for psychological themes, is in tune with the humanists of his time. Leyden, though strongly influenced by the German master, has not Diirer's depth of thought. He does 65 PRINTS not infuse that deeper meaning into his plates. Following the bent of his Germanic mind, he reverts to the simple, daily scenes of life, and when he undertakes to render scenes from other times and from distant places, he transforms them into events of his own day and his own surroundings. He can thus express himself with the directness of an eye-witness, and therein lies much of the charm of his work, which was much appre ciated even in Italy. One of the few large plates of Lucas van Leyden will illustrate his artistic and technical powers. The "Adora tion of the Magi," broad in composition, sober and harmonious in the handling of the graver, typically Northern in feeling, is per haps the finest of his achievements. Later in life his restless, searching mind was diverted to the allurements of Italian grace of form, and gave itself up to its influence without reserve. A great wave of enthusiasm for Southern ideals swept over the entire North about the 66 ts a a ' HO Aop GERMANY third decade of the sixteenth century. It established the supremacy of Italian stand ards of artistic merit, which — as we know — were not such as to give new life to the graphic arts. This wave of Italian influence was felt in the immediate following of Diirer, in that group of painter-engravers, known to us as the "little masters," though little only in the size of their plates. A high stand ard of technique is common to them all, with variations in their perfection. Varia tions there are also in the measure in which they yielded to Italian influence. Their graver was devoted to the rendering of a great variety of subjects; Northern charac teristics are still evident in their portraits, in their Biblical scenes with German types of figures. Northern customs are depicted with Northern minuteness; on the other hand, the study of Southern models has developed in these Northern engravers an appreciation of the beauty of the nude, which is freely introduced in mythological, allegorical, Bib- 67 PRINTS lical, and other subjects, and very skill fully handled. We are apt not to appreciate the gravity of this Italian invasion, of this Southern supremacy in Northern art. Ideal perfection of form was a new language to the Germanic artists, accustomed to the real istic, faithful rendering of nature as they saw it, with all its facts, perfections, and imper fections alike. The change often meant that the artist forgot his native tongue, if the expression may be used — a harsh tongue, if you will, but sincere and expressive; in re turn he acquired, often but imperfectly, a new language in which his expression needs must be imitative, not original. The true Northern spirit still greets us in the woodcut productions of that period.' Woodcut was used for subjects of wide pop ular interest, for Passion series, portraits, religious subjects, and all manner of illus tration. Diirer had used the relief proc ess extensively for such purposes, likewise Burgkmair, who was, with Diirer, one of the 68 H 2 Zl o a «, 3 s OS O 3 H =3 GERMANY foremost designers for the extensive publica tions of Emperor Maximilian. Lucas Cran- ach elected the strong, emphatic woodcut for much of his graphic work, prominently employed in the service of the Reformation. An example of his work, this tournament scene, is a reminder of the times in which he dwelt, and an illustration of his vivid power of presentation, typically Northern with its crowded figures. Other masters there are in plenty, whom we must neglect, as we shift our abode to Basle for a moment. We find ourselves here, about 1516, in the midst of a thriving pub lishing center. Enterprising printers seek to secure pleasing decorations and illustrations for their scientific and literary output. They look for a good draughtsman to design some tasteful headings and end-pieces, borders and initials, and are well pleased with the samples submitted by a young newcomer, by name Hans Holbein. At first the cutting of his designs offers some difficulties, but when 69 PRINTS the right man has appeared, when Hans Liitzelburger has joined his skill to the genius of Holbein, their joint productions attain a peerless mastery. High summits in art always invite comparison; this is true of Diirer and Holbein, even though these two great German masters are so widely different from each other. Diirer is nowhere greater than in engraving, while Holbein excels in painting; both are masters of woodcut. Diirer, with his scholarly, analytical nature, ponders over the deep, essential meaning which underlies the multitude of his obser vations, and sets down his conclusions in types broadly generalized. His St. Jerome — to quote but one instance — is not so much a specific old man in his study as the expression of a mental attitude common to mankind generally. Holbein is more a man of impulse, quick to express himself in a direct manner full of life. He is more sensual, and has much feeling for pleasing form and a beautiful flow of lines. He accents the event 70 GERMANY itself more strongly than Diirer, who is given to express himself rather by association of ideas. It is a significant fact that Diirer chooses his subjects with preference from the figurative New Testament, with its parables, while Holbein prefers to illustrate the Old Testament, a book of essentially historical character. Every scene is plainly told and intensely human in Holbein's Biblical illus trations, as well as in that masterpiece of his, the " Dance of Death." We cannot but mar vel at the feeling of spaciousness in these small prints, at the lifelike action of the expressive little figures, at the perfect har mony of these figures and their surround ings. At the time of Diirer's death, in 1528, the long period of warfare, devastation, and misery had begun which was to end only after the Thirty Years' War. Emperor Max imilian was dead; Charles V had broken the power of France in Italy; his mercenaries had sacked Rome, and incidentally ruined 71 PRINTS Marcantonio, the Italian engraver. His promising school was dispersed. It was a period of decline, both north and south of the Alps. From that time on, the successive influ ences of Italy, of the Netherlands, and of France sway the character of German art. A clever superficiality develops, which adapts itself to the characteristics of the art in vogue. Etching, the sister art of engraving, cannot boast any signal triumphs during this period of German art, although, from the early days of its adoption, it was used to a considerable extent by the Hopfer family. Diirer experi mented with the process, but soon returned to engraving. The greatest German etcher of the following (seventeenth) century, Wenzel Hollar, followed the Earl of Arundel to England, there to build up his fame. VI THE NETHERLANDS The seventeenth century, which witnesses German art in its decline, brings about a wonderful flowering of art in the neighboring Netherlands. This country had passed from Burgundian rule to the Hapsburg dynasty. With the advent of Charles V, it passed under the rule of Spain. The master hand of that emperor had been able to curb the feeling of unrest and ferment caused by the Reformation, but the oppressive measures of his somber successor, Philip II, drove the Dutch and Flemish people to rise in arms for the defense of their liberties. A long, cruel war of emancipation ensued, and near its close there came a parting of the ways which bears directly upon our subject. In 1598, the division occurred ; the southern — Flemish — provinces remained true to the House of Hapsburg, true also to the long-estab- 73 PRINTS lished Catholic faith. Consequently their art retained its strongly religious element, tinged with Italian traditions. The great exponent of this Flemish trend of art is Peter Paul Rubens, of whom more pres ently. The northern (Dutch) provinces adopted the teachings of Calvin, and soon established their independence. Their churches were bare of any pictorial adornment; their art was forced, therefore, to develop mainly in the sphere of home life. If we term Ru bens the leader of Flemish art, Rembrandt stands for the highest development of Dutch art. Between these two leaders lies a broad field with many blending, interweav ing influences, many local characteristics, in this magnificent epoch. The only way to approach the subject in a few brief sen tences is by considering as one vast unit the whole period of seventeenth-century art in the Netherlands, both Dutch and Flemish. It will ever be a matter for surprise that 74 IOHANNES ZVFJE.NVS. J^.XSTKT:7J.T>cmmi,lt. ( Orvoris effiaicm | ¦/.. .<« A Tkfei . : *«i:ii'« m v- ilvH -" ...,^\ ^f^ ¦¦Fv ' \4r \» ^fl ft" W mPL.^V it ^iaJC^il * MRS. CARNAC John Raphael Smith ENGLAND Smith. One is apt, quite naturally, to ac cord to engravings like this the credit due to the painter for his graceful composition. Quite aside, however, from matters of com position and beauty of subject, the mere charm of intense shadow and brilliant high light, with transitions of breath - like deli cacy, rendered with the velvety richness pe culiar to mezzotint, will readily explain the vogue and costliness of such prints. No half-tone reproduction, however good, can convey an idea of the texture of mezzotint ing. An examination of good, early impres sions of mezzotint portraits by such men as McArdell, Watson, Ward, Green, Reynolds, or other notables of the scraper, will prove their merits much more convincingly than words. While portraiture is the field par excellence of mezzotint achievement, other possibilities of the process are evidenced by plates like the flower and fruit piece here shown, in which Richard Earlom proves himself a 113 PRINTS gifted interpreter of Huysum. The varied surfaces, the delicate bloom on the fruit, and all those little touches dear to the Dutch painter — sparkling dewdrops, insects, the velvety underside of an overturned leaf — are faithfully reproduced. We almost seem to see the actual colors of the painting, so carefully have the values been gauged. In no other process could the painting have been transcribed more pleasingly. The men tion of Earlom as the engraver of a large series of landscape plates, the "Liber Verita- tis," after sketches by Claude Lorrain, leads us to J. M. W. Turner, to whom these plates suggested the well-known "Liber Studio- rum," but of this more in our review of the nineteenth century. In the matter of woodcut, little need be said in this brief outline, aside from Jack son's chiaroscuros, until we come to Thomas Bewick and with him to an important re vival of the relief process in modified form. Bewick recognized the possibilities of the 114 FLOWER AND FRUIT PIECE Richard Earlom ENGLAND wood block, if cut across the grain, instead of plank wise as used for the old woodcut. The plank block necessitates the use of the knife; a cross-grain block of boxwood on the other hand, permits the use of that king of instru ments, the graver. Wood - engraving once established by Bewick, and elaborated by his followers, rapidly spread over Europe, ultimately to reach its highest form of tech nical perfection in the United States. IX THE UNITED STATES In early days, the American colonies were indifferent if not inhospitable to the fine arts. Only portraiture and expressions of patriotism found a welcome, both in paint ing and engraving. These, with some maps, diagrams, and views, gave partial employ ment to a few engravers, with such addi tions to their number as landed from time to time from Europe for a sojourn more or less prolonged. Prominent among early ar rivals was Peter Pelham, an artist of good abilities, who portrayed in mezzotint a num ber of New England ministers. Passing on to the Washington period, we find in Charles Willson Peale an American painter-engraver of merit. Such mezzotint portraits as General and Lady Washington, Lafayette, Franklin, and others easily rank 116 THOMAS JEFFERSON David Edwin THE UNITED STATES among the best native productions of that period. David Edwin, an immigrant from England, brought proficiency in stipple en graving. His merits can be judged from the best of his plates, the portrait of Thomas Jefferson, appropriately simple and digni fied in execution. With the advancing nine teenth century, engraving becomes plentiful in this country. Publishers require many portraits, views, subjects of all kinds, nor must we forget the important and flourish ing branch of bank-note engraving. This teeming activity brings with it a commer cial sameness of execution, a workmanlike, metallic sleekness, not quite absent even in the charming vignettes of John Cheney, which adorn the gift-books of the forties and fifties. A portrait of Chief Justice Mar shall, engraved by Asher Brown Durand, after Inman's painting, is shown as an illus tration of good nineteenth - century work. Generally speaking, portrait engraving had fallen into a rut, suggested by the tonality 117 PRINTS of photographs, a development shared by wood-engraving. The ingenious innovation of the English man Thomas Bewick — which rejuvenated and refined the mishandled and discred ited woodcut, by substituting cross-grained blocks of boxwood and the graver, for planks and the knife — was championed in Amer ica by Dr. Alexander Anderson. None of the early American wood-engravers were en dowed with great artistic gifts, but ere long the steady demand by publishers brought to the fore men of acknowledged ability. Their achievements are plentifully illustrated in books and magazines; the "Still-life with the Peacock," engraved by W. J. Linton, a well-known writer on wood-engraving, is reproduced here as a reminder of their skill. Originally the tendency of wood-engraving, or white-line engraving, as it is sometimes called, had been to obtain effects by white lines (the natural expression of the graver on the black surface of the block) and by 118 CHIEF JUSTICE MARSHALL Asher Brown Durand STILL-LIFE WITH THE PEACOCK Wood-engraving. W. J. Linton THE UNITED STATES black and white masses. As the wood-en graver grew proficient in his technique, he widened his field by imitating the effect of etching or engraving on copper, in rivalry with this form of illustration. In this he succeeded so well that the other, more ex pensive modes of adornment were largely driven from the field of book illustration. With the advent of photography, the de sign could be fixed upon the wood block mechanically, accurately, without the trou ble of a careful drawing. The values of tone in the photograph relieved the engraver from the work of translating color-values into black and white. The blending half tones of the photograph invited close imi tation, and thus tone-engraving developed, with its masses of fine lines, close together, merging into tone. Beautiful results were achieved in this way by men like Jiingling, French, Timothy Cole, Wolf, and many other engravers; but soon the human hand was dispossessed altogether by the half- 119 PRINTS tone plate which makes the photographic image printable by mechanical means alone. The great European revival of etching extended to the United States in the seven ties. It proved a fruitful period, with names like the Morans, Ferris, Farrar, Duveneck, Charles Platt, and many others which might be mentioned. The vogue of etching, it will be remembered, was short because medi ocrities soon glutted the market and sent purchasers to other fields for a while. Inter est in the process has awakened again of late, but that is matter of too recent date to be discussed in these few pages. X THE NINETEENTH CENTURY From a survey of prints in their varying national aspects, we have arrived now at that vast period of an art increasingly cos mopolitan, the nineteenth century. In these last hundred years nationality has blended together to a great extent; travel is not the serious matter of former times, a pastime rather than a venture; all races have inter mingled in the great world- centers; students from far and near congregate in the centers of art. All these factors, and many others, contribute in making artistic expression individual, less and less national in charac ter. No sudden phase, this, rather an insen sible general trend toward individuality as the great requisite in an artist's work. The masterpieces of the fine arts had been inter preted by means of prints since the sixteenth, and especially since the advent of the "clas- 121 PRINTS sical" engravers in the eighteenth, century. The increasing number of these reproductive prints made it ever easier for an artist to acquaint himself, in a way, with the great achievements of the past. Finally photogra phy, and in its wake the photo-mechanical processes, brought a flood of exact docu ments invaluable for study, a lure to imita tion for the unimaginative or indolent, a spur to the real artist, helpful in forming his own powers. Individuality seems the keynote of the nineteenth century; hence it may be as well not to bind ourselves to headings and subdi visions, but rather to roam at large through this enormous sphere. Goya, of whom we spoke in a preceding chapter, belongs here by right, and with Fortuny forms the Span ish contingent in the new awakening of the graphic arts. In England there lived, about the turn of the century, a visionary poet and great artist, William Blake, who fluently expressed himself in strangely fascinating 122 /7 PLATE FROM THE BOOK OF JOB William Blake THE NINETEENTH CENTURY compositions of religious or fantastic im port, doubtless familiar to us all. Our con cern is not with Blake's drawings, in which he adds the charm of exquisite color to his command of expressive form. A plate taken from his remarkable series of illustrations to the Book of Job, shows his powerful, poetic conception of the beginning of life, when the world was young and the morning stars sang together. In a totally different way, illus trative of another phase of this same new awakening, the work of Daniel Chodowiecki shows a man concerned with the world which surrounds him. We see him here, at work in the midst of his family, on his little illustra tions which went forth in their hundreds to embellish the bountiful stream of German literature. Goya's vivid, realistic allegories, Blake's fantastic, powerful conceptions, Chodowiec- ki's living portrayal of the world of his day, no longer follow the beaten track of imi tative work, — all these activities point to a 123 PRINTS new phase in art. All this seems a reaction, a protest against the mental attitude, the set standards and ideals of the eighteenth cen tury. The vignette, so gay and graceful in the hands of Eisen, Gravelot, or Moreau, had lost much of its esprit in the heavier, more sober style of the Empire. The classi cal engraver was still in power, on the Con tinent as well as in England, where Boydell issued, in 1803, his monumental series of illustrations to Shakespeare's plays in large folio plates. On the other hand, Constable had broken away from the accepted stand ards of landscape composition; he painted his native countryside as he saw it. Eng land frowned upon him for this heresy, but his art was joyfully acclaimed in France. There arises everywhere a buoyant, youthful spirit, conscious of infinite possibilities, filled with unbounded aspirations. The leaders in the movement emancipate themselves from the sterile cult of precedent; they blaze new trails into the vast unknown, in their search 124 as O rt THE NINETEENTH CENTURY for truth. Kant's philosophy, Darwin's the ory of evolution, sufficiently denote the trend of the times; in literature, this is the period of Byron, Scott, Wordsworth, of Manzoni, of Goethe, of Nodier, Balzac, Vic tor Hugo. Barry e carries realism into his sculpture and such men as Delacroix, De camps, and Celestin Nanteuil carry roman ticism into French painting and French prints. Men, these, whose imaginative souls rebel against petrified classicism and formal, abstract beauty, and this protest of the young and ardent against the tyranny of the "old and accepted order of things" has been heard ever since, — sometimes the voice of coteries, sometimes that of individu als: Constable's, for instance, which helped France in its remarkable awakening. His simple creed was faithfully transposed in terms of mezzotint by David Lucas. Unfor tunately these effective landscape mezzo tints are so fleeting in their delicate effects that they can be appreciated only in en- 125 PRINTS graver's proofs. The relative position of Constable and Turner, in English land scape, has been, not inaptly, compared with that of Van Dyck and Rubens in Flemish art. Certainly J. M. W. Turner was a sun in the English firmament, the painter of im posing canvases and water-colors of haunt ing loveliness; the leader likewise in a stupendous development of landscape en graving revealed in series like his "England and Wales" and his vignettes for "Roger's Italy" among others of equal fame. Su preme among his prints stands a set known as "Liber Studiorum," undertaken in rivalry with Claude Lorrain, whose memoranda sketches of pictures painted constitute the "Liber Veritatis," engraved subsequently in England by Earlom. In his "Liber" 1 Turner proceeds to display his art in all its versatility, engraving some of the plates 1 A series of one hundred plates, seventy-one of which were published by the artist, then discontinued, because financially unsuccessful. 126 His A S tf .2 £5 CQ \ .'. *¦ * 4 SW./ili' pj 9 id T .",«f.;;T ,t*fat' ¦¦**&!£'•$?' / .. ft " » --" - r " , t . _ .j. _ . . 1. __ ... _' BJ ¦ ft.« W r S ^ a THE NINETEENTH CENTURY himself and closely supervising the mezzo tinting of the others. This "Inverary Pier," his own throughout, is a glorious vision of morning on the shores of Loch Fyne. The night mists are clearing in the sunlight; a luminous haze still trails along between the hills, beyond the quiet water. The scene suggests unbounded space and calm, peace ful beauty. Another plate, "iEsacus and Hesperie," carries us into the depth of the woods. The figures are mere accessories: what we potently feel is the fragrant shade, emphasized by a slanting shaft of sunlight, which gleams on soil, branch, and leaf, and builds a pathway of light amidst the lumi nous shadows. In the early nineteenth century two new processes demand recognition : wood-engrav ing and lithography. The former, reviewed in the preceding chapter with reference to its development in America, speedily gained in technical perfection at the hands of English 127 PRINTS engravers. It spread far and wide in Europe, adapting itself to the charming illustrations of Ludwig Richter and doing full justice to the expressive, accurate line of Adolph von Menzel's pen-and-ink work. Light and vi vacious in the vignettes of Tony Johannot, Gigoux, Celestin Nanteuil, it grows somber in Dore's designs for the Bible and for Dante's "Divina Commedia." Shortly after the advent of wood-engrav ing, lithography appears, and offers the tempting inducement of utmost technical simplicity to the artist. The drawing is made on the stone or on transfer paper with litho graphic ink or crayon; the transferring and preparation of the stone (or metal plate) with acid, gum, and water is left to the printer. No wonder that the process found wide favor and that it was put to a great va riety of uses: innumerable portraits, endless series of views, costume plates, music titles, reproductions of pictures. In the hands of artists the process proves its merit by such 128 x £ & g> s - ft. xo oou THE NINETEENTH CENTURY prints as "Christ Disputing with the Doc tors," by Adolph von Menzel, that untiring pioneer of realism in Germany. The scene with its masterly characterization is aston ishing in the play of expression on each face and figure. In France both processes burst into profuse bloom with the awakening of romanticism. The thirties and forties bring a wealth of notable lithographic produc tions, the work of Delacroix, Isabey, Geri- cault, Decamps, Diaz, and a host of other artists. Gavarni uses this easy medium to portray in thousands of sketches the life of all Paris. Daumier portrays the frailties of humanity in his cartoons for "Charivari" and "La Caricature," or else wields his crayon as a formidable political weapon; in the print selected for illustration he shows us Louis Philippe at the death-bed of a po litical offender " who can now be released, being no longer dangerous." The fortunes of France, fraught with con quest under the first Napoleon, sink to 129 PRINTS humdrum levels with the Restoration. For years all recollection of the Emperor and his Grande Armee is embittered by the final dis aster. But passing years restore the luster of former great exploits, and gradually these become a favorite subject for illustration. The field is well covered by Charlet's mili tary scenes, though none of these approach the grandeur and skill displayed by Auguste Raffet. In his "Midnight Review" we see innumerable hosts of shades, passing in re view before the phantom emperor on his white charger; an immense concourse in sensibly merging into the mists of night. In the forties there is a welcome revival of etching, Charles Jacque being one of the pio neers, skillful alike in his handling of acid and dry-point. His theme is the peasant's life, his setting the wooded, undulating re gion about Barbizon: broad, sunny fields, thriving farms, pastures with cattle, sheep, and pigs, for which he shows an especial predilection. The peasant, here, is no longer 130 M 3 WOMAN CHURNING J. F. Millet THE NINETEENTH CENTURY the joyous, carousing, merry being of Os- tade's fancy. In the plates of Millet and Jacque we see him at his daily labors and the woman at her household tasks, as in the "Woman Churning," by Jean Francois Millet, drawn in sober, telling lines, and evoking by some subtle magic a sense not only of the scene before us, but of her sur roundings and her whole labor-laden life. We must pass with a mention even such masters as Corot and Daubigny, both of whom have left us spirited examples, in etch ing, of their masterly interpretation of na ture. The period we now reach brings a flood of etching, and it is but natural that the sketchy freedom, the suggestiveness sought by this new school, should conflict with the set, time-honored traditions of en graving. That serious old gentleman — En graving — did not approve of the rollicking youngster who knocked at the gates of the Academy and the Institut for admission. The battle, after all, was not so much a 131 PRINTS quarrel between etching and engraving; rather a contest between formula versus orig inal thought. Both in England and France the same conflict arose, the etchers calling the other side mechanical, petrified; the en gravers retorting that etching, "even in the hands of Rembrandt, is uncertain, blunder ing." This dictum of Ruskin and the fiery rejoinder by Sir Seymour Haden are mat ters of history. Our illustration, the dry- point "Sunset in Ireland," will sufficiently show that the president of the Painter- Etchers' Society was as apt with the etch ing-point as he was formidable in debate. The painter-etcher is an originating artist, but the success of his creations on the cop per depends a good deal on the skill of the printer, who can, by differences of inking, wiping, pressure, and heat make an impres sion hard or soft in effect, rich and dark or pale and silvery at wish. To a man of James McNeill Whistler's exquisite sensibilities and refined taste this thought of depend- 132 1 ¦ ^eSSEbA HI f *M Ehl Pr'1' ¦ ' H| ^ISPr Hi: 1 ' fly I'M i 1 |: : j drfwsm :¦ , ' ' He : . mmHi. HEji||'"f ¦]ii t^^cl ; " Hi Rlf If1 - KW| ;/ Ml Jit-. fifi "3 pat THE DOORWAY. VENICE James McNeill Whistler LE PETIT PONT CharleB Meryon THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ence on another for his subtle effects of light and tone could not but prove unendurable. Therefore he installed a press at his home and did his own printing of choice impres sions, realizing in these, to the fullest extent, the possibilities of effectiveness and beauty which we admire in his etchings. Art has been defined as a selection from the truth, and, indeed, the elimination of unimportant detail and the accenting of the essentials make for the great charm in Whistler's etch ings as well as in his numerous lithographs. From this versatile genius, delightful in his rendering of the human figure and likeness, who evokes with equal facility the shimmer ing vistas of Venetian lagoons or the quaint- ness of an old French street, who can fas cinate with a fleeting glimpse of a fish-shop, or make a lovely vision of a foggy reach of the Thames, we must now turn to one who has forever fixed in his plates a truthful yet ideal likeness of old Paris. "Le Petit Pont" by Charles Meryon is a characteristic plate 133 PRINTS with heavy shadows, fine feeling for struc tural essentials, endless modifications of light, and with Notre Dame made duly im pressive by lifting it high above the nearer buildings. Every plate has a character of its own, with here and there a weird reminder of the artist's ultimate mental doom. Only a poet could have conceived a plate like the "Stryge," that evil figure on Notre Dame, surveying the vast field of his con quests. As we survey the reproductive processes, they are drawn, one and all, into the cur rent of new, original expression. Innovators appear even in the conservative camp of en graving; Ferdinand Gaillard, for instance, an engraver, in that he uses the graver, though he uses it in a manner to him particular, ex pressive of minutest detail. "My aim," he says, "is not to charm but to be truthful. My art consists in saying all." And he ex presses "all" in this wonderful portrait of 134 DOM PROSPER GUE5RANGER Ferdinand Gaillard "^''^•^j™™™- ®.\ * J (fl Mflffln' ' ' ¦¦¦'¦¦'"•¦'''"¦¦¦''-'', '"" ' : • Yifj GIRL BATHING Anders Zorq ""T^^i*^. -\M, ,_ ^mJL \ '¦ m i -.¦;*r.' **-- *M • " S3t> EXPULSION FROM PARADISE From "Eva und die Zukunft." Max Klinger THE NINETEENTH CENTURY Dom Prosper Gueranger. No detail has escaped him in his scrutiny of this strong, bright face with its searching, clear eyes. A counterpart of Gaillard — a painter-en graver similarly minute and precise with his burin — is Stauffer-Bern, a Swiss of German training. Now, if we compare a print of the early times with the technical creations of our present day, we cannot but realize the in creased demands made upon the artist. The phenomena of light must be ever studied anew, in the endeavor to attain new, effec tive, convincing ways of expression — not merely of color and form as heretofore, but of atmosphere, of light, of vibrating, living, I had almost said " moving, " nature. Hence impressionism; hence, also, daring experi ments like this girl bathing, by Anders Zorn, the Swedish painter-etcher. Here is a dis tinct outdoor feeling; the breeze and sun, the modeling of rock, and the softly rounded nude body against its hard face. Every- 135 PRINTS thing is done with long, slashing strokes, with hardly any definite outline; a wonder ful display of skill. Another illustration, the "Expulsion from Paradise," by that Ger man master of many arts, Max Klinger, shows us an effect of most intense expres sion of light in the glaring foreground, where a merciless sun beats down on the first couple: a world all the more arid by con trast with the cool, shady woodland behind the huge, guarded gateway. The nearer we approach to the present day, the more difficult, even painful, be comes the work of selection; painful because of the many gems barred from inclusion by the necessary restriction of space. A longer review, including men like Lalanne, Legros, Lepere, Schmutzer, Geyger, Munch, Lieber- mann, Bone, Cameron, Bauer, would needs have to include many others, and dispropor tionately swell this closing chapter. If the few prints mentioned — a very few picked from a field immensely rich — 136 THE NINETEENTH CENTURY should awaken in the reader a desire for further exploration in this world of prints, the purpose of these pages will have been achieved. THE END Books Recommended for Study of Prints To those bent on further inquiry into the subject of prints, two books of prime importance can be most warmly recommended, namely : — Hind, Arthur M. A Short History of Engraving and etching, with full bibliography, classified list and index of engravers. Boston, Houghton Mifflin Co., 1908. (An excellent, comprehensive book, with exhaustive lists and indexes, dealing with intaglio prints up to the present day.) Kristeller, Paul. Kupferstich und Holzschnitt in vier Jahrhunderten. Berlin, Bruno Cassirer, 1905. (A masterly review of the whole field of prints, in cluding woodcuts, but unfortunately exclusive of the nineteenth century. This also contains an extensive bibliography.)The careful perusal of either book will provide a good foundation, and the excellent lists of books at the end of each of them will safely guide the reader in his subsequent studies. CAMBRIDGE . MASSACHUSETTS V . S . A :¦/'- Bis;fiffiiSi5-Sfip