Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 20.djvu/741

* WOOD-ENGRAVING. 633 WOOD-ENGRAVING. AUilorfer (U8S-1538) of Uutisbuii, Hans Sebald Beliani, and Ueinrich Aklt'f^rever; of especial inipciitance was ilans Ualdung at .Strassljurg. Duriiij; the latter half of the sixteenth century wood-engraving declined in Germany, partly ow- ing to the conii)etitin of line engraving, which caused disastrous changes in the art. It was lost in the general decay of the arts resulting upon the Thirty Years' War. Outside of Germany there was important ac- tivity in the Netherlands, where Lucas van Ley- den did especially good worlc, in rivalry with Diirer. The chief artists in the later sixteenth century were Ilendrik Goltzius and t'hristopher Sichem, and in the seventeenth Christopher Jegher did some excellent work after Kubens. In France the chief masters of the sixteenth cen- tury were Jean Cousin, whose ascribed designs are in the true spirit of the Renaissance, and Bernard Salomon (c.l.i50). the leading designer of Lyons. In the seventeenth and eighteenth cen- turies the most important engravers belonged to the families Lesueur and Papillon. .Jean Mi- chel Papillon is an example of the careful mi- nuteness of technique that characterized the de- clining art. He was the first to use the tougher boxwood in place of apple and pear, and wrote the first important Treatise on Eiiijruviny (1700). In Italy great masters of the Renais- sance occasionally drew for woodcuts; as Titian, whose designs were engraved by Boldrini and others at Venice, and Leonardo, who illustrated Paccioli's De I'roporlione Diriiia (1.500). But the art never became thoroughly acclimated, nor was there the same need for pojjular instruction by this means. CiiiARCSCURo. A. variety of wood-engraving which acliieved fine results was the so-called chiaroscuro, which is derived from two or more printings of identical blocks in diflferent shades of the same grave color, svich as sepia or a soft warm gray. It owes less to the engraver than to the printer, upon whose work it chiefly de- pends for its effects of light and shade and gra- dations of tint. The designing may be done with a pen or brush, and the effect resembles that of a wash drawing. Chiaroscuro engraving was probably invented at the beginning of the six- teenth century by Jost de Negker at -ugslnirg. E.xcellent work was done in Germany by Hans Baldung and other artists, and the art was intro- duced into Italy by Ugo da Carpi, who practiced at Venice, his first print being dated 1518. It was a favorite means for the reproduction of masterpieces in painting, and attained the high- est proficiency in Italy. The chief master in the latter half of the sixteenth century was Andrea Andrenni. whose masterpiece was Jfnntegna's "Trimiiph of Ca-sar." The last good chiaroscu- rist in Italy was Coriolani in the seventeenth century. In France the art was practiced with success by Nicolas Lesueur ( l(!fll-17r)4), some of whose work is most admirable in delicacy of execution, and in England by .John Baptist Jackson (1701-80), who did very effective work, especially after the great Venetian painters. ^loDERN Wood-Engraving. The great dif- ference between early and modern wood-engrav- ings is that the latter is tlone on the end of the grain on the wood, which is sawed crosswise, instead of the side of the wood sawed lengthwise. The surface being therefore much harder. it is done with a graver instead of a knife. Bo.xwood, the hardest variety of wood and most rcguhir in grain, is generally used instead of the ancient jiear or apple. It is not certain by whom these new methods were in- vented, but they were first used with greatest success in England by Thomas Bewick (17.53- 182S), wlio is the real founder of modern wood- engraving. The most characteristic fea- ture of his work, which is indeed the essential feature of modern engraving, is the uniform use of the while line — the design being formed of the part cut away from the block, instead of the fiart left standing, as formerly. This Jiractice was made feasible by the suiistitution of the graver for the knife, and was not invented by ]2ewick, as is commonly supimsed. He possessed, moreover, a very remarkable originality of de- sign, and his works possess a ])athetic intensity which renders them singularly attractive, quite aside from their high technical merit. His best productions are the illustrallons to ISritish Quad- rupeds (17!)0), British liivds { 17117), and a large engraving, the "Chillingham Bull." Con- temporary with Bewick. William Blake produced an original and artistic set of illustrations, though defective in technique, for Thornton's, edition of Vergil's Pastorals' {'i-20). In the hands of Bewick's pupils the woodcut became a serious rival of line engraving in the illustration of important literary works. Charlton Nesbit and Luke Clennell practiced it with great merit, the former excelling in line, the latter in artistic feeling. Robert Branston, on the other hand, founded a school which imi- tated copper engraving, relying upon the black line rather than the white. John Thompson en- graved, though with independence, after the de- signs of the line engraver .John Thurston, and in the works of Orrin Smith and William Harvey wood-engraving lost its distinctive qualities. The illustrated newspapers and magazines, bringing the need of rapid jiroduction, caused a still further decline of the art. The engraver became a mere artisan. In vain did W. J. Linton en- deavor to introduce the practice of rendering artists' drawings by lines conceived and arranged by the engraver himself. The Inlluence of the American scliool (see below) failed to revive it, but finally led to a complete preference on the part of the public for the more accurate photo- graphic processes. The revival of wood-engraving in Germany be- gins at the end of the eighteenth century with the two Ungers, father and son. professors in the Berlin Academy, whose work, however, was still done with the knife, and especially with their successors. Gubltz and Unzelmann. Of very great influence were the blocks designed by Adolf ilen- zel for the illustration of dift'erent works on Frederick the Great, engraved bv the brothers Vogel. Eduard Kretzschmar. and others. Other prominent wood-engravers of the nineteenth cen- tury were Blasius Hfifel in Vienna ; Allgaier and Siegle, who engraved Kavilbach's J'ei/iiard the Fox (1863) ; Biirkner and Gabner, the engravers of Ludwig Richter's designs ; and especially, at the present time. Max Kllnkicht in Freiburg. German wood-engraving is precise and careful in execution, but rather harsh in color. The colored prints from woodcuts now so extensively produced in Germany are not an artistic success.