WOOD ENGRAVINGS.
To turn to a more practical side of book illustration. The first
principle of illustration is to _illustrate_, and yet it is a fact that
few illustrations in books or magazines are to be found in their proper
places in the text.
It is seldom that the illustration (so called) is in artistic harmony
with the rest of the page, as it is found in old books. One of the great
charms of Bewick's work is its individuality and expressive character.
Here the artist and engraver were one, and a system of illustration was
founded in England a hundred years ago which we should do well not to
forget.[21]
We are fast losing sight of first principles and aiming rather at
catching the eye and the public purse with a pretty page; and in doing
this we are but imitators. In the English magazines it is strange to
find a slavish, almost childish imitation of the American system of
illustration; adopting, for instance, the plan of pictures turned over
at the corners or overlapping each other with exaggerated black borders
and other devices of the album of the last generation. This is what we
have come to in England in 1894 (with excellent wood engravers still),
and the kind of art by which we shall be remembered at the end of the
nineteenth century! I am speaking of magazines like _Good Words_ and
_Cassell's Magazine_, where wood engraving is still largely employed.
It may be as well to explain here that the reasons for employing the
medium of wood engraving for elaborate illustrations which, such as we
see in American magazines, were formerly only engraved on copper or
steel, are--(1) rapidity of production, and (2) the almost illimitable
number of copies that can be produced from casts from wood blocks. The
broad distinction between the old and new methods of wood engraving is,
that in early days the lines were drawn clearly on the wood block and
the part not drawn cut away by the engraver, who endeavoured to make a
perfect fac-simile of the artist's lines. It is now a common custom to
transfer a photograph from life on to the wood block (_see p. 167_),
also to draw on the wood with a brush in tint, and even to photograph a
water-colour drawing on to the wood, leaving the engraver to turn the
tints into lines in his own way.
In the very earliest days of book illustration, before movable
type-letters were invented, the illustration and the letters of the text
were all engraved on the wood together, and thus, of necessity (as in
the old block books produced in Holland and Belgium in the fifteenth
century), there was character and individuality in every page; the
picture, rough as it often was, harmonising with the text in an
unmistakable manner. From an artistic point of view, there was a better
balance of parts and more harmony of effect than in the more elaborate
illustrations of the present day. The illustration was an illustration
in the true sense of the word. It interpreted something to the reader
that words were incapable of doing; and even when movable type was first
introduced, the simple character of the engravings harmonised well with
the letters. There is a broad line of demarcation, indeed, between
these early wood engravings (such, for instance, as the "Ars Moriendi,"
purchased for the British Museum in 1872, from the Weigel collection at
Leipsic, and recently reproduced by the Holbein Society) and the last
development of the art in the American magazines. The movement is
important, because the Americans, with an energy and _naivete_ peculiar
to them, have set themselves the task of outstripping all nations in the
beauty and quality of magazine illustrations. That they have succeeded
in obtaining delicate effects, and what painters call colour, through
the medium of wood-engraving, is well known, and it is common to meet
people in England asking, "Have you seen the last number of _Harper's_
or the _Century Magazine_?" The fashion is to admire them, and English
publishers are easily found to devote time and capital to distributing
American magazines (which come to England free of duty), to the
prejudice of native productions. The reason for the excellence (which is
freely admitted) of American wood-engraving and printing is that, in the
first place, more capital is employed upon the work. The American
wood-engraver is an artist in every sense of the word, and his education
is not considered complete without years of foreign study. The American
engraver is always _en rapport_ with the artist--an important
matter--working often, as I have seen them at _Harper's_, the _Century
Magazine_, and _Scribner's_ in New York, in the same studio, side by
side. In England the artist, as a rule, does not have any direct
communication with the wood engraver. In America the publisher, having a
very large circulation for his works, is able to bring the culture of
Europe and the capital of his own country to the aid of the
wood-engraver, spending sometimes five or six hundred pounds on the
illustrations of a single number of a monthly magazine. The result is
_an engraver's success_ of a very remarkable kind.
[Illustration: XXXV.
_A Portrait_ engraved on wood at the Office of the CENTURY MAGAZINE.
Example of portraiture from the _Century Magazine_. It is interesting
to note the achievements of the American engravers at a time when wood
engraving in England is under a cloud.
This portrait was photographed from life and afterwards worked up by
hand and most skilfully engraved in New York.
(_Photograph from life, engraved on wood. From the Century
Magazine._)]
A discussion of the merits of the various styles of wood engraving, and
of the different methods of drawing on wood, such as that initiated by
the late Frederick Walker, A. R. A.; the styles of Mr. William Small, E.
A. Abbey, Alfred Parsons, etc.--does not come into the scope of this
publication, but it will be useful to refer to one or two opinions on
the American system.
"Book illustration as an art," as Mr. Comyns Carr pointed out in his
lectures at the Society of Arts ten years ago, "is founded upon wood
engraving, and it is to wood engraving that we must look if we are to
have any revival of the kind of beauty which early-printed books
possess. In the mass of work now produced, there is very little trace
of the principles upon which Holbein laboured. Instead of proceeding
by the simplest means, our modern artist seems rather by preference to
take the most difficult and complex way of expressing himself. A wood
engraving, it is not unjust to say, has become scarcely
distinguishable from a steel engraving excepting by its inferiority."
Mr. Hubert Herkomer, R. A., who has had a very wide experience in the
graphic arts, says:--
"In modern times a body of engravers has been raised up who have
brought the art of engraving on wood to such a degree of perfection,
that the most modern work, especially that of the Americans, is done
to show _the skill of the engraver_ rather than the art of the
draughtsman. This, I do not hesitate to say, is a sign of decadence.
Take up any number of the _Century_ or _Harper's_ magazines, and you
will see that effect is the one aim. You marvel at the handling of the
engraver, and forget the artist. Correct, or honest, drawing is no
longer wanted. This kind of illustration is most pernicious to the
student, and _will not last_....
"America is a child full of promise in art--a child that is destined
to be a great master; so let us not imitate its youthful efforts or
errors. Americans were the first to foster this style of art, and they
will be the first to correct it."
Mr. W. J. Linton, the well-known wood engraver, expresses himself thus
strongly on the modern system, and his words come with great force from
the other side of the Atlantic:--
"Talent is misapplied when it is spent on endeavours to rival
steel-line engraving or etching, in following brush-marks, in
pretending to imitate crayon-work, charcoal, or lithography, and in
striving who shall scratch the greatest number of lines on a given
space without thought of whether such multiplicity of lines adds
anything to the expression of the picture or the beauty of the
engraving. How much of talent is here thrown away! How much of force
that should have helped towards growth is wasted in this slave's play
for a prize not worth having--the fame of having well done the lowest
thing in the engraver's art, and having for that neglected the study
of the highest! For it is the lowest and the last thing about which an
artist should concern himself, this excessive fineness and minuteness
of work.... In engraving, as in other branches of art, _the first
thing is drawing, the second drawing, the third drawing_."
This is the professional view, ably expressed, of a matter which has
been exercising many minds of late; and is worth quoting, if only to
show the folly of imitating a system acknowledged by experts to be
founded on false principles.
But there is another view of the matter which should not be lost sight
of. Whatever the opinion of the American system of illustration may be,
there is, on the other side of the Atlantic, an amount of energy,
enterprise, cultivation of hand and eye, delicacy of manipulation, and
individual industry, cleverly organised to provide a wide continent with
a better art than anything yet attempted in any country. Some fine
engravings, which the Americans have lately been distributing amongst
the people, such, for instance, as the portraits (engraved from
photographs from life) which have appeared in _Harper's_ and the
_Century_ magazines, only reach the cultivated few in Europe in
expensive books. It is worth considering what the ultimate art effect of
this widespread distribution will be. The "prairie flower" holds in her
hand a better magazine, as regards illustrations, than anything
published in England at the same price; and a taste for delicate and
refined illustration is being fostered amongst a variety of people on
the western continent, learned and unlearned. That there is a want of
sincerity in the movement, that "things are not exactly what they seem,"
that something much better might be done, may be admitted; but it will
be well for our illustrators and art providers to remember that the
Americans are advancing upon us with the power of capital and
ever-increasing knowledge and cultivation. In the _Century_ magazine,
ten years ago, there was an article on "The Pupils of Bewick," with
illustrations admirably reproduced from proofs of early wood engravings,
by "photo-engraving."
This is noteworthy, as showing that the knowledge of styles is
disseminated everywhere in America; and also, how easy it is to
reproduce engravings by "process," and how _important to have a clear
copyright law on this subject_.
Of the English wood engravers, and of the present state of the
profession in England much has been written. I believe the fact remains
that commercial wood engraving is still relied on by many editors and
publishers, as it prints with more ease and certainty than any of the
process blocks.
That there are those in England (like Mr. Biscombe Gardner and others,
whose work I am unable to reproduce here), that believe in wood
engraving still as a vital art, capable of the highest results, I am
also well aware. But at the moment of writing it is difficult to get
many publishers to expend capital upon it for ordinary illustrations.
On the next page is an example of good wood engraving.
[Illustration: "DRIVING HOME THE PIGS." (JOHN PEDDER.)
(_Academy Notes, 1891._)]
[Illustration: No. XXXVI.
_Joan of Arc's House at Rouen_, by the late SAMUEL PROUT.
Engraved on wood by Mr. J. D. Cooper, from a water-colour drawing by
Samuel Prout.
The original drawing, made with a reed pen and flat washes of colour,
was photographed on to the wood block, and the engraver interpreted
the various tints into line. The method is interesting, and the tones
obtained in line show the resources of the engraver's art, an art
rather carelessly set aside in these days.
This engraving is from _Normandy Picturesque_. (London: Sampson Low &
Co.)]
FOOTNOTE:
[21] In _The Life and Works of Thomas Bewick_, by D. C. Thomson; in
_The Portfolio_, _The Art Journal_, _The Magazine of Art_, and in
_Good Words_, Bewick's merits as artist and engraver have been
exhaustively discussed.
[Illustration: DESIGN BY WALTER CRANE.]