Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 56, No. 346, August, 1844. Various

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СКАЧАТЬ present, looking to future value. Etching, is still old enough to interest by its portraiture of ages gone by. The inventor is not known. Perhaps the earliest specimen is the well-known "Cannon" by Albert Durer, dated 1518; and there is one by him, "Moses receiving the Tables of the Law," dated 1524. The art was soon after practised by Parmegiano, and extended to general use. Yet it is clear that the real power and merit of etching was not known to the inventor, nor to those who, in its early state, applied themselves to it. The first aim seems to have been exact imitation of the graver. Le Bosse, in his treatise on engraving, makes the perfection of the art consist in the close similitude of the graver's work. It was this which at first cramped the artist, and delayed the progress of etching, and gave it not only the appearance, but the reality of inferiority—and often times the name and reputation of inferiority is as prejudicial as the thing itself, and we verily believe that it still has its effect upon the public taste. Artists have not sufficiently taken to etching. We have had more amateurs excel in it than professional artists. There was a collection of amateur etchings at Strawberry Hill, given to Walpole by the etchers. The greater part of them is excellent, though they are mostly copies from other works, but not all. There are some surprising imitations of Rembrandt. The best are by Lady Louisa Augusta Neville, afterwards Lady Carlisle.

      Then, again, the union of etching and engraving has certainly retarded the art, and has given it another character. If that union has engrafted freedom on engraving, it has given to the needle too much precision—it has taken from it the working out effects. We have elsewhere noticed that the taste for the precise and labored engraving in landscape, introduced by Woollet, drove out from the field that which was very superior to it. The prints from Claude and Poussin, by Vivares Wood, Mason, and Chatelet, and published by Pond, are infinitely more characteristic of the masters than the works which succeeded them. But we speak here only of imitation. It is in the original handling of artists themselves, not in translated works, and according to the translating phraseology, "done by different hands," that we are to look for the real beauty and power of the art. It is this handwriting of the artist's original mind that constitutes the real beauty; we would not have a touch of the graver to any work professing to be an etching—the graver cannot be used with impunity. If it will admit of any adventitious aid, it may perhaps be, in a very subordinate degree, mezzotint and aquatint. But etching rather improves Prince Rupert's invention than is advantaged by it. The sootiness of mezzotint is dangerous—in bad hands it is the "black art" of Prince Rupert, though the term was applied to a metal of the prince's invention, not to his discovery of mezzotint.

      Modern times have brought the art of engraving to a wonderful perfection. Its mechanical work is most exquisite, and reaches the whole effect of picture surprisingly. If the publishing public knew as well what to engrave as our engravers know how to engrave, we should not see our printsellers' windows teem with worthless works beautifully executed. We often wonder, as we stop occasionally to look at the display, where the purchasers are found for things that pain the eye and weary the mind to see—history, or landscape, or familiar life, it matters not, nearly all without feeling, elaborate nothings—obtrusions, unless we are disposed to examine only the work of the engraver; and even then we must lament to see it thrown away, or rather employed in disseminating bad taste. How rarely is it we see even a subject of any value or interest attempted! It is, as in our play-writing, not the subject, but the peculiarity of some actor, that is to be written up to; so the peculiarities of some few flashy favourite artists employ our best engravers, who ought to be far otherwise employed, in making transcripts from the best works, ancient or modern, by which taste may be improved, the mind enlarged, and the heart made to feel as it ought. If our flashy prints are the index of the public taste in this country, we have little of which to boast; and we undoubtedly keep our artists from rising to any worthy aim, by showing them how satisfied we can be with mediocrity, and even some degrees below it. There is, in etching, a lightness and playfulness of execution which excuses, if it does not quite reconcile us to a bad subject. We lose the idea of effort in the freedom. To present to the eye a laboured nothing, is to disgust by the sense of labour alone. We calculate the time and cost, and look for an object worthy the outlay in vain, and become thoroughly dissatisfied. We have a great mind to describe the process of etching, that the lovers of art who read Maga, and happen to be ignorant of it, may try their hands—it is very fascinating work, and even the uncertainty in the first attempts, and the very failures, give pleasure in the operation. There is something more pleasant in hoping our labour will turn out well, than knowing it. If there be any whose time hangs heavy on their hands, let them take up etching. Johnson lamented that men did not work with their needles, considering the employment of the hands a great aid to thought—and so it is. Now the etching-needle is the one a man may take up without becoming ridiculous. As there are so many "Handmaids" to the art, from which the whole mystery may be learned, we forbear. We have, however, turned to our friend Gerard Larresse for the purpose of setting down, secundum artem, a practical account, and find it not: but we like little old treatises better than modern, there is something unsophisticated in their manner of giving information, and there is no study of periods, which, in their music, steal away the understanding; so we refer to Faithorne. But nevertheless our friend Gerard, if he does not give information, supplies amusement. He thinks every thing best told by an emblem—so receive, reader, his pictorial account of the art; we cannot give his plate, so be content with his description of it, that is, Etching. "This beautiful virgin, sitting at a table, has before her a copperplate, lying on a sand-bag; and near it stands a little monkey, placing a lighted lamp before her. She is attended by Prudence and Diligence, and Practice is setting the tools on an oil-stone. Her chair is of ebony, adorned with figures of Sincerity and Assiduity, wrought in ivory, and mutually embracing; behind which stands Judgment, showing her a little further, Painting, accompanied by Apollo and Diana; he holding up his torch, in order to enlighten Sculpture, and she hers reversed, with purpose to extinguish it; the Genii, in the mean time, are every where busy in providing necessary materials. The eldest offers her a drawing, either redded or whited on the back, and a point or needle for tracing it on the plate; this drawing represents the design he is going about. Others, in an inner apartment, are employed in heating a plate on a chafing-dish, and laying the ground even with a feather. Here, one is etching—there, another biting a plate; others taking and reviewing proofs, with great attention and pleasure—while Fame, having a proof of a portrait in her hand, with her trumpet sounds out at a window the praises of masters or engravers. Honour, crowned with laurel, and bearing a small pyramid, is entering the room, ushering in Annona or Prosperity, who has a cornucopia, or horn filled with fruits. Round the room are set on pedestals divers busts of famous etchers and engravers; as Marc Antonio, Audlan, Edelinck, Vander Meulen, and several other Italian and French, as well as Dutch and German masters. In the off-skip, Europe, Asia, and Africa appear standing in surprise at the sound of the trumpet." There is nothing like example! Who sees in this prophetic enigma, in his "chair of ebony," other than "Ebony" himself, the "most accomplished Christopher," beaming with "sincerity," and placid in his "assiduity," with "Judgment" waiting upon him at command, wielding neither crutch nor pen, but, in affable condescension, the contemned needle etching the portrait of his own "Colonsay," and his own famous exploit, to show that one needle in the hand of genius can make a man and a horse too; though nine tailors and nine needles scarcely make up the complement of a man—yet would these nine in one, the renowned of Brentford, scarcely have matched "Christopher on Colonsay!" And as for Fame blowing out of the window, he, in spite of himself and his modesty, is his own trumpeter, and, as Maga reaches them, surprises "Europe, Asia, Africa," and America too. Such is the emblematical representation of etching, and we have embellished it with a first-rate performer.

      And now let us turn to "Etched Thoughts by the Etching Club." We find a new name or two added to the list—C.G. Lewis, the renowned and best of etchers; and Severn, whose etchings are new to us, not so his other works of art. We remember his "Ship of the Ancient Mariner," and his expressive, sentimental, figures; and poor Fearnley—now no more—we remember greatly admiring a somewhat large picture of his—"A River-Scene in Norway,"—evidently painted immediately from nature, powerfully, expressively given. Somehow or other he did not take in this country, and quitted it, leaving behind him very beautiful studies strangely undervalued, and sold for little. The fact is, he was too true to the solemnity and sobriety of nature to please a public led СКАЧАТЬ