Читать книгу Modern Illustration - Joseph Pennell - Страница 8

“CHRIST AND PETER.” BY CARACCI. Wood-engraving by the Linnells.

“THE HOLY FAMILY.” BY PERUGINO. Wood-engraving by the Linnells.

Nowhere were the conditions of illustration more deplorable than in England when Bewick, and Stothard, and Blake appeared upon the scene. There was a decided revolution when Gay's "Fables," the "General History of Quadrupeds," "British Land and Water Birds," all illustrated by Bewick's wood-engravings, were issued. Bewick, as has been said before, and cannot be repeated too often, was an artist who happened to engrave his designs on wood, instead of drawing them on paper or painting them on canvas; he was not a mere wood-engraver, interpreting other men's work which he only half understood or appreciated; and this is a distinction to be borne in mind. Bewick, virtually, did for himself what the new mechanical processes almost succeed in doing for contemporary illustrators. For him were none of the difficulties and miseries of the draughtsman who made his designs on the block, saw them ruthlessly ruined by an incompetent, or unscrupulous engraver, and then had but the print, which could not prove the reproduction to be the wretched caricature of the original that it really was. This was the chief reason for Bewick's success. He invented wood-engraving; he showed what good work ought to be; in a word, he revolutionized the art of illustration in England.[6]

Whatever may have brought about this sudden activity and revival of excellence, Bewick's books were far from being its sole outcome. "The Songs of Innocence and Experience," the "Inventions to the Book of Job," Blair's "Grave," Mary Wollstonecraft's stories, with Blake's illustrations, belong to the same period, though this was but a chance. The illustrations were mostly done on metal, and Blake had his own peculiar methods. He belongs to no special time or group.

BY STOTHARD. FROM AN ORIGINAL DRAWING IN THE POSSESSION OF THE AUTHOR.

FROM A PAINTING BY WILSON. Wood-engraving by the Linnells.

FROM A PAINTING BY RUBENS. Wood-engraving by the Linnells.

Book after book with Stothard's illustrations, the "Pilgrim's Progress," Richardson's novels, tales now forgotten, above all, Rogers' "Poems," with the engravings by Clennell, helped to prove the possibilities of good illustration, and emphasize, by force of contrast, the inappropriateness of work done by some of the most popular Academicians of the day for Boydell's "Shakespeare," immortalized by Thackeray as that "black and ghastly gallery of murky Opies, glum Northcotes, straddling Fuselis."

BY STOTHARD. FROM ROGERS’ “POEMS” (CADELL). Engraved on wood by Clennell.

But the most important outcome of Bewick's work was the appearance of an excellent school of wood-engravers in England: Clennell, Branston, Harvey and Nesbit, the Thompsons, the Williamses, and Orrinsmith. These engravers tried, in the beginning, to produce exactly the same sort of work that is being done by the so-called school of American wood-engravers to-day. One has only to look at Stothard's illustrations to Rogers' "Poems," engraved by Clennell, to see an example of facsimile engraving after pen drawing. But, as a general thing, these men all endeavoured to imitate the qualities of steel engraving or etching. First, because steel or metal engraving was the prevailing form of illustration, enjoying, for a while, tremendous popularity in the long series of "Keepsakes," "Forget-Me-Nots," and "Albums;" and, secondly, because they were forced mainly to copy old metal engravings, since scarcely any artist, always excepting Stothard and a few others, knew how to draw on the wood. So great was the rage for popularizing engravings on metal, that John Thompson projected an edition of Hogarth on wood, about two inches by three, showing that, instead of being able to produce new work done specially for the wood, engravers were continually thrown back upon the copying of steel or copper-plates, or the work of their predecessors. Another notable instance, though published much later, is that of the first illustrated catalogue of the National Gallery by the Linnells.[7]

BY STOTHARD. FROM ROGERS’ “POEMS” (CADELL). Engraved on wood by Clennell.

In France, however, there were plenty of artists, willing to draw on the wood, who could not get their designs engraved, at the very time that in England there were plenty of engravers who could find no artists to draw for them.

FROM TITIAN, “ARIADNE AND BACCHUS.” Wood-engraving by the Linnells.

In 1816 Charles Thompson went to Paris, partly for pleasure and partly in search of work. He was at once successful. He arrived at the right moment: already a Society for the Encouragement of National Industry in France had offered a prize of two thousand francs for wood-engravings done in that country, so impressed had Frenchmen been with the excellence of the work produced in England.

BY HARVEY. FROM “MILTON’S POETICAL WORKS” (BOHN). Engraved on wood by Thompson.

BY HARVEY. FROM “MILTON’S POETICAL WORKS” (BOHN). Engraved on wood by Thompson.

A little later on, Lavoignat and other engravers came over and worked in London with the Williamses. The result was, that, within ten years of their return, a school of wood-engravers, nearly as good as the English, arose in France, together with a number of draughtsmen, greatly superior to those of England. Among the engravers who should be mentioned are Best, Brévière, Leveille, Lavoignat, Piaud, Pisan, and Poirret. They worked after Gigoux, the Johannots, Isabey, Paul Huet, Jacque, Meissonier, Charlet, Daubigny, Daumier, Gavarni, Monnier, and Raffet.

FROM AN ORIGINAL DRAWING ON THE WOOD BY HARVEY.

BY HARVEY. FROM MILTON’S POETICAL WORKS (BOHN). Wood-engraving, unsigned.

In both countries this new illustration began to make its mark about 1835. Although, in its own way, Bewick's engraving was unsurpassed, still a refinement, a freedom, was introduced by the French artists, and a faithfulness of facsimile by their engravers, many of whom, as I have said, were English, quite unknown at that time in work published in England. So great was the reputation of these illustrators, artists and engravers both, that two Germans, Braun and Roehle, came to Paris to work with Brévière. This international exchange of engravers has kept up, in a measure, till the present time; M. Lepère, for instance, studied in England with Smeeton, while it is well known that the director of the "Graphic" was working in Paris almost up to 1870.

In 1830 I think one may safely say that the first really important modern illustrated book, in which wood was substituted for metal engraving, appeared in France. This was the "Histoire du Roi de Bohème," by Johannot. Though published twenty years later than Rogers' "Poems," with Stothard's illustrations, as an example of engraving it was scarcely any better. But the designs—little head and tail-pieces—were so good that they were used over and over again by "L'Artiste," the organ of the Romanticists, in which they were accepted as the perfection of illustration.

At this date there is to be noted in England, among the best work done, the beautiful alphabet by Stothard, published by Pickering.

BY THURSTON. FROM BUTLER’S “HUDIBRAS” (BOHN). Wood-engraving, unsigned.

If, up to 1830, England and France were in equal rank, so far as illustration went, for the next ten or fifteen years France utterly eclipsed her earlier rival. In 1833 appeared the "Gil Blas"[8] of Gigoux, containing hundreds of drawings, which all Frenchmen, I believe, consider to be the illustrated book of the period. To Gigoux, Daniel Vierge owes more probably than he would care to acknowledge; while Gigoux himself is founded on Goya. In 1838, however, was issued a book which, in drawing, engraving, and printing, completely outdistanced anything that had heretofore appeared in England or in France: Curmer's edition of "Paul et Virginie," dedicated by a grateful publisher, "Aux artistes qui ont élevé ce monument typographique à la mémoire de J. H. Bernardin de Saint-Pierre." These artists include the names of nearly everyone who was then, or soon became famous in French art. The book contains marines by Isabey, beautiful landscapes by Paul Huet, animals and figures by Jacque, and, above all, drawings by Meissonier, who contributed over a hundred to this story and to the "Chaumière Indienne," published under the same cover. All the best French and English engravers collaborated. Even the printing was excellent, for the use of overlays, made by Aristide Derniame, had begun to be fully understood.[9] The printers' name deserves to be remembered: Everal et Cie.