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Title: Drawings in pen & pencil from Dürer's day to ours
- with notes and appreciations
Author: Charles Geoffrey Holme, - To be updated
Language: English
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- with notes and appreciations" ***
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DÜRER'S DAY TO OURS ***
DRAWINGS IN PEN & PENCIL
FROM DÜRER’S DAY TO OURS
WITH NOTES AND APPRECIATIONS
BY GEORGE SHERINGHAM
EDITED BY GEOFFREY HOLME
LONDON: THE STUDIO, Lᵀᴰ 44 LEICESTER SQUARE, W.C.2
MCMXXII
PREFATORY NOTE
In the original circular relating to this volume it was announced that
Mr. Malcolm C. Salaman would contribute the letterpress. The Editor
desires to express his sincere regret that, owing to serious
indisposition, Mr. Salaman has been unable to fulfil this intention.
The Editor wishes to acknowledge his indebtedness to the following
owners who have kindly lent drawings for reproduction in this volume:
Messrs. Ernest Brown and Phillips (The Leicester Galleries), Mr. William
Burrell, Lt.-Col. Pepys Cockerell, Mr. Campbell Dodgson, C.B.E., Mr.
Charles Emanuel, Mr. William Foster, Mrs. G. R. Halkett, Mr. Harold
Hartley, Mr. Francis Harvey, Mr. C. C. Hoyer-Millar, Mr. J. B. Manson,
Mr. A. P. Oppé, Monsieur Ed. Sagot, Mr. Edward J. Shaw, J.P., Monsieur
Simonson, Mr. G. Bellingham Smith, Mr. Roland P. Stone, Mr. D. Croal
Thomson, Mr. Charles Mallord Turner and Sir Robert Woods, M.P. Also to
Messrs. William Marchant & Co. (The Goupil Gallery), Mr. T. Corsan
Morton, Mr. E. A. Taylor and Mr. Lockett H. Thomson for the valuable
assistance they have rendered in various ways; and to Messrs. G. Bell &
Sons, Messrs. Chapman & Hall, Messrs. Charles Chenil & Co., Messrs. J.
M. Dent & Sons, Mr. William Heinemann, and the Proprietors of _La
Gazette du Bon Ton_, _Punch_ and _The Sketch_ for permission to
reproduce drawings of which they possess the copyrights.
CONTENTS
“Notes and Appreciations.” By George Sheringham 1
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
Albano, Francesco. Pen Drawing. Photo, Anderson 58
Artist Unknown. Drawing in Pencil and Chalks. Photo, Giraudon 72
Barbieri, Giovanni Francesco. (See Guercino)
Bateman, H. M. _An Open Space_ (pen) 140
Beardsley, Aubrey. _John Bull_ (pen) 120
“ “ Pen Drawing 121
Béjot, Eugène. _Le Quai de Paris à Rouen_ 178
Belcher, George. Drawing in pencil and wash 141
Bell, R. Anning, R.A., R.W.S. Pen Drawing 164
Bellini, Gentile. _The Turk_ (pen). Photo, Anderson 40
“ “ _The Turkish Lady_ (pen). Photo, Anderson 41
Blake, William. _The Soul hovering over the Body_ (pen and wash) 119
Blampied, E., R.E. _The Sick Mother_ (pen) 147
Bone, Muirhead. _Front of the Quirinal Palace, Rome_ (pencil) 160
“ “ _Quai du Canal, Marseilles_ (pencil) 161
Botticelli, Sandro. _Abundance_ (pen & pencil) 47
Boutet de Monvel, Bernard. _Venus et l’Amour_ (pen) 182
“ “ “ “ Pen Drawing 183
Brangwyn, Frank, R.A. _The Steam Hammer_ (pen and chalk) 139
Burne-Jones, Bart., Sir Edward. _Seven Works of Mercy_ (pencil) 126
Callow, William, R.W.S. _The Rialto, Venice_ (pencil) 132
Canaletto. Pen Drawing. Photo, Mansell 76
Carlègle, E. Pen Drawing 184
Clarke, Harry. Pen Drawing 151
Claude Lorrain. Pen Drawing 71
Constable, John, R.A. _Salisbury_ (pencil) 85
Correggio. _The dead Christ carried off by Angels_ (pen). Photo,
Brogi 31
Cosway, Richard, R.A. _Henry_ (pencil and chalk) 83
Cotman, John Sell. _On the Yare_ (pencil) 86
Crawhall, Joseph. Pen Drawings 166
Dance, George, R.A. _Parke, Musician_ (pencil) 87
Daumier, Honoré. _En Troisième_ (pen and wash) 98
“ “ _Les Trois Connaisseurs_ (pen and wash) 99
Dulac, Edmund. Pencil Study 170
Du Maurier, George. Pen Drawing 113
Dürer, Albrecht. _A Courier_ (pen). Photo, Anderson 25
“ “ _The Rhinoceros_ (pen). Photo, Anderson 26
“ “ _The Procession to Calvary_ (pen). Photo, Brogi 27
“ “ _Praying Hands_ (pen). Photo, Mansell 28
Emanuel, Frank L. Pencil Drawing 138
Fisher, A. Hugh, A.R.E. Pencil Drawing 143
Flint, W. Russell, R.W.S. _Women quarrelling_ (pencil) 134
Forain, J. L. Pen Drawing 174
Foster, Birket, R.W.S. Pen Drawing 92
Fragonard, J. H. _Cupids playing around a fallen Hermes_ (pen) 79
Gainsborough, Thomas, R.A. _The Harvest Wagon_ (pen).
Photo, Mansell 82
Girtin, Thomas. _Carnarvon Castle_ (pencil) 89
Greenaway, Kate. Pen Drawing 116
Griggs, F. L. Pen Drawing 165
Guardi, Francesco. _Venice_ (pen) 77
Guercino, Il. Pen Drawing. Photo, Anderson 57
Hill, Adrian. _Folkestone_ (pencil) 137
Hill, Vernon. _A Sleeper_ (pencil) 158
Holbein, Hans. _The Family of Sir Thomas More_ (pen) 29
Houghton, A. Boyd. Pen Drawing 111
Hubbard, E. Hesketh. _S. Anne’s Gate, Salisbury_ (pencil) 154
Hughes, Arthur. _Unseen_ (pen) 118
Ingres, J. A. D. _Madame Gatteaux_ (pencil). Photo, Mansell 95
“ “ _Paganini_ (pencil) 96
“ “ _C. R. Cockerell_ (pencil) 97
Jones, Sydney R. _Near Chesham, Bucks._ (pen) 157
Jouas, C. Drawing in pencil and coloured chalks 175
Keene, Charles. Pen Drawings 105 to 109
Lalanne, Maxime. _Delft_ (pen) 171
Laroon, Marcellus. _A Hunting Party_ (pen & pencil) 78
Lawrence, Sir Thomas, P.R.A. _Lady Mary Fitzgerald_ (pencil) 93
Leonardo da Vinci. Pen Studies. Photos, Anderson and Brogi 32
“ “ “ _Head of an Old Man_ (pencil) 33
“ “ “ _Madonna and Child_ (pen). Photo, Anderson 34
“ “ “ _Head of a Young Woman_ (pen). Photo,
Braun & Co. 35
Lepère, A. _Le Vieux Menton_ (pen) 176
“ “ _Crèvecœur_ (pen) 177
Lhermitte, L. Pen Drawing 146
Mahoney, James. Pen Drawing 110
May, Phil. _A Portrait of her Grandmother_ (pen) 122
“ “ Drawing in pencil and chalk 123
McBey, James. _The Stranded Barge_ (pen) 167
Meryon, Charles. Pencil Drawing 101
Michelangelo. Pen Drawings. Photo, Anderson 42, 43, 46
“ Pen Drawing 45
Morland, George. Pencil Drawing 86
New, Edmund H. _Grasmere Church_ (pencil) 152
North, J. W., R.A. _The Gamekeeper’s Cottage_ (pen) 117
Orpen, Sir William, R.A. _Mother and Child_ (pencil) 148
“ “ “ _After Bathing_ 149
Ospovat, Henry. “_Life might last! We can but try_” (pen) 163
Ostade, Adriaen van. _Tavern Scene_ (pen) 68
Parmigianino. Pen Drawing. Photo, Brogi 75
Partridge, Bernard. _Place du Pillori, Pont-Audemer_ (pen) 133
Pellegrini, Riccardo. _Palm Sunday in Italy_ (pen) 125
Peruzzi, Baldassare. Pen Drawing. Photo, Anderson 37
Philpot, Glyn W., A.R.A. Pencil Study 168
Pinturicchio, Bernardino. _Young Woman with Basket_ (pen)
Photo, Brogi 31
Pinwell, C. J. _The Old Couple and the Clock_ (pencil) 115
Poulbot, F. Pen Drawing 181
Poussin, Nicolas. Pen Drawing 70
Rackham, Arthur, R.W.S. Pen Drawing 150
Raphael. Pen Drawings. Photo, Anderson 49, 53
“ _La Vierge_ (pen). Photo, Mansell 50
“ Pen Study. Photo, Mansell 51
Raphael, School of. Pen Drawing. Photo, Anderson 54
Rembrandt. _Lot and his Family leaving Sodom_ (pen). Photo,
Anderson 61
Rembrandt. _Saskia_ (pen) 63
“ _Old Cottages_ (pen) 64
“ Pen Drawing 64
“ _Judas restoring the Price of his Betrayal_ (pen).
Photo, Braun & Co. 65
Rossetti, Dante Gabriel. Pencil Drawing 127
Roubille, A. Pen Drawing 179
Russell, Walter W., A.R.A. Pencil Study 159
Sambourne, Linley. _The Black-and-White Knight_ (pen) 131
Shepperson, Claude A., A.R.A., A.R.W.S. _The Child_ (pencil) 135
Sime, S. H. Pen Drawing 155
Spurrier, Steven. Pencil Study 144
Steinlen, T. A. _Les Bûcherons_ (pen) 172
“ “ _Laveuses_ 173
Stevens, Alfred. Pencil Study 102
Sullivan, Edmund J., A.R.W.S. _Robespierre’s List_ (pen) 145
Tenniel, Sir John. _“What’s this?” said the Lion_ (pencil) 128
“ “ _Three little Men_ (pencil) 128
Tiepolo, G. B. _Faun and Nymph_ (pen) 73
Tintoretto. Pen Drawing. Photo, Brogi 59
Titian. Pen Drawings 38, 39
Tonks, Henry. Pencil Study 169
Turner, J. M. W., R.A. _Carew Castle Mill_ (pencil) 90
“ “ “ _Monow Bridge, Monmouth_ (pencil) 91
Velasquez. _Philip IV_ (pen) 60
Velde, Adriaen van de. _Le Passage du Bac_ (pen). Photo, Mansell 69
Veronese, Paolo. Pen Studies 55
Verpilleux, E. Pencil Drawing 153
Vinci, Leonardo da. (See Leonardo).
Visscher, Cornelis. Portrait Study in pencil 67
Walker, Fred, A.R.A. _A Dark Deed_ (pencil) 112
Whistler, J. McNeill. _Girl with Parasol_ (pen) 129
Wilkie, Sir David, R.A. _The Mail Coach_ (pen) 103
Winterhalter, Franz Xaver. Portrait Studies in pencil 81
Printed by Herbert Relach, Ltd., 19-24, Floral Street, Covent Garden,
London, W.C.2.
NOTES AND APPRECIATIONS
A drawing is a thing to be looked at and not written about. Pages and
pages written about it will not make a good drawing bad nor a bad
drawing good; nor will they, unfortunately, really equip and instruct
anyone to know the one from the other--should he happen to lack that
subtle sense whereby such things are known; for the reason why one
drawing is justly ranked as a masterpiece while another is thrown away
lies hidden on the plane of our more transcendental perceptions--such,
for example, as the sense whereby we know whether a note is in tune or
out of tune; and further: whether a musical composition is base in its
gesture or great. At present the majority of people lack these senses
but, due to a guiding justice, this fact rarely if ever prevents the
artist who has achieved something great from receiving, though it may
have been long retarded, his full meed of praise eventually. That the
praise is so often belated and the appreciation of an artist retarded
until, for him, it has lost its savour is due to many causes: so long as
the competitive and childish habit persists--of awarding the palm of
greatness to one man’s work by the simple expedient of simultaneously
condemning someone else’s--narrowness and prejudice will continue to
trouble the artist. It should surely not be difficult to realize that
the world of art--like the Kingdom of Heaven--has many mansions, and
that, though both have their “housing problems,” still--in both there is
room for many.
In life the “housing problem” for the artists is acute and vexed--they
have to scramble for a place and, in the scramble, if some are unduly
praised far more are unduly blamed. Death seems to be the only arbiter
of justice for them. In the struggle for recognition none are more
unscrupulous and narrow than the artists themselves; with the instinct
of self-preservation strongly developed in them they, metaphorically,
deal what they hope will be death-blows at all who stand in their way.
It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for an
artist to be a just critic of his contemporaries. The truth of this
assertion is easily tested: ask an artist his opinion of a mixed dozen
of old masters--he will have words of praise for all of them and his
comparisons will be just and true. Then ask him his opinion of a dozen
of the leading artists of his own day--he will not have words of praise
for more than two; and if by chance he should still be a student in the
schools he will find himself only able to praise one of them; and the
remarks he will make about the others will be in questionable taste!
Even our most revered old masters gave way to this human weakness. For
instance, Michelangelo treated Leonardo as though he held him in
profound contempt; especially in a little matter connected with the
casting of a bronze. In fact--each paid the other the compliment of
jealousy.
The deplorable battle that had to be waged before Whistler’s genius
could be accepted is also a good example. In the very forefront of the
fight rode Whistler shamelessly wounding, for the sake of his own
aggrandizement, his opponents, who were really his brother artists.
Viewed at this distance of time it looks a dirty business, and several
good artists are only now healing of their wounds. He is forgiven of
course, firstly because he was a genius of a high order and secondly
because of his wit and the irresistible style with which he handled his
weapons; and thirdly because he was, of course, most venomously attacked
on all sides himself. It was the power of Whistler’s caustic wit that
caused the prestige of our leading art society to become so undermined
that, until quite recently, many of our greatest living artists could
not face the ignominy of exhibiting there; and to this day one still
meets with the bashful student who has to deny himself any visits to its
exhibitions!
* * * * *
Fenollosa says: “Art is the power of the imagination to transform
materials--to transfigure them--and _the history of Art should be the
history of this power_ rather than the history of the materials through
which it works.” In the limited size of this book neither the one nor
the other history is attempted of European pen & pencil art. Had
either been intended the English draughtsmen could not so preponderate
in it. That they do so is due to the fact that the book is intended
primarily for the English public, and is published in the hope that it
may help somewhat to stimulate its appreciation of what its own artists
have done and are doing, and what the great masters did in the past.
* * * * *
Drawings have this great advantage--that they convey their meaning
instantly. They tell their story more swiftly than a telegraph-form,
whereas ideas on a printed page have to be assimilated in the usual
processional order. So whoever looks through this collection of drawings
with intelligent interest must be rewarded with a share in the vision of
many great men on a great variety of subjects. And whether he is
conscious of the process or not he must retain some memory of each;
perhaps--with luck and other qualities--a very clear memory. For it is a
gain, a privilege and a delight to be able to assimilate in an instant
the fine idea of a great artist. Surely, too, it must give to the reader
a momentary feeling of freedom from the shackles of space and time. My
point is that it would take the briefest writer many pages to present to
the student of psychology the personality and character of, say, the
_Earl of Surrey_, as they are conveyed to him by Holbein’s drawing--in
one _coup d’œil_. And it would be indeed a long book that gave him as
adequate a presentment (as do these drawings) of a hundred different
persons, places and incidents by a hundred different writers. For in
this book are drawings that will teach him to see like gods, like
super-men, like birds, like swashbucklers, and even to see with the eyes
of little old ladies. And Michelangelo, in return for a glance, will
give him his great conception, and Mr. Bateman will crack ten jokes with
him in as many seconds.
But it takes two to establish a work of art--the artist and the other
man; and even then the other man can only take from it what he can put
into it: Mr. Bateman’s jokes fall flat if the other man has no sense of
humour. Michelangelo has no message for the man entirely unfamiliar with
fine ideas. The artist can but launch his work of art on the world and
hope that the other man will recognize it.
Such diversity of presentment as the collection of drawings in this book
gives should do something to inculcate a more catholic appreciation of
art than one finds in that unpleasant being--“the average man.” It is
the critic’s business to educate the public to that catholicity of
appreciation, but unfortunately he may delight in doing the opposite:
too often Ruskin’s eloquent writings did but beautifully express his
bigoted prejudices. His eloquence succeeded in foisting upon the public
as masterpieces--meriting comparison with the works of Titian and
Tintoretto--certain banal, third-rate Victorian water-colours. And he is
committed to a description of Canaletto as a _base_ painter--because
Canaletto painted into a picture what Ruskin considered an unworthy
artifice. The critical faculty is to a considerable extent intuitive and
sub-conscious, and therefore to concentrate only along a special line of
thought is the worst possible training for a critic. However, the
English people, having ceased to rely so completely on John Ruskin to do
their thinking for them, and growing suspicious of the carping of that
most irascible critic have, among other things, discovered the splendid
sincerity of Canaletto for themselves. Let us hope that they had the
generosity, in embracing Canaletto, to do so without discarding someone
else of equal value; but, as a rule, immobile minds cannot take in a new
thought without first ejecting some other:--our grandfathers worshipped
at Raphael’s shrine; our fathers at Turner’s and we--losing interest in
both--have “discovered” Velasquez; the talk in the schools and coteries
is of Leonardo and Uccello while Rubens, too, is forgotten or
disapproved. Cannot Uccello be great without the depreciation of
Raphael! Or must partisan hero-worship be carried on about art in the
same spirit as the butcher-boys of rival firms wear light or dark blue
ribbons on one special day in the spring!
Surely the real value of art in this world lies in its diversity and
infinite variety. The artist’s principal function in the community is
that he teaches it to see. This is the great man’s final achievement. So
that men who come after him say: “Ah, it was Rembrandt who taught us how
glorious a thing is light”; “it was Whistler who showed us the mystery
of the evening and the beauty of the Thames”; “Turner who gave us
sunsets and Velasquez who taught us the marvel of our physical vision
and showed us the very air we breathe.” As each new artist reaches the
height of his art our horizon should grow wider and the vision of the
world more rich. The new generations are going to teach us the beauty of
our back streets and gasometers. Good luck to them, for when they have
done it our dullest walks will have a zest!
* * * * *
But Art cannot be of the most truly vital and evolutionary kind unless
it is born of national inspiration and has its roots in the social and
spiritual life of a people--growing in response to their conscious need
and desire for it. We adulate the great Italian artists instead of
paying our homage to the Italian people for producing them--as they
undoubtedly did, by desiring them; for art was not only a joy to their
kings and prelates but _a spiritual need to themselves_. In such an
atmosphere great men were bound to arise to give form to the ideals and
emotions of the nation. Other countries have in equal degree made this
demand at certain periods of their history; to mention the more
obvious--Egypt, Persia, Greece, China, France, Japan. And in
answer--great men have arisen to express what were really _national
ideals_ in concrete form. The demands of a king and his court may
produce a Velasquez; the desire of a city may produce a Watteau or a
Sargent; but only the desire of a nation can produce a great school in
art.
Religion once held the artist as her most valuable ally and was,
invariably, the source of his inspiration in all the greatest
masterpieces he gave the world in all branches: whether in architecture,
sculpture, painting, or in the lesser arts of carving, illuminating,
embroidery, jewellery. For art has ever reached its high-water mark in
the expression of religious ideals or in ministering to the needs of a
religious civilization: the temples of Egypt, Greece and Ancient India;
the paintings of the great schools of Italy, China, Flanders and Japan;
the sculptures of the Parthenon and the Renaissance; and even the ju-jus
of Africa and Australasia (about the virtues of which Chelsea mimics the
adulations of Paris) were one and all oblations to the gods. But
Religion in a frenzy of madness drove the artist from her sanctuaries
and has not yet admitted the disastrous results of her crime. And all
over the world--in the East as well as in the West--the artist has now
retaliated and has gone elsewhere for his inspiration (and,
incidentally, has turned, for the most part, for his appreciation to the
race who are still forbidden by the sacred tenets of their faith to make
to themselves “any graven image”). And art is now only the demand of the
few.
At this particular point in history--a fact that should give us to
think--the peoples of all the world are very far from clamouring to see
their ideals given form through art. That many of them have ideals and
can formulate their desires this generation has had ample proof; as for
instance it had of the English--in the war. But the English have given
innumerable proofs, too, that the desire of the mass of this people does
not tend towards the arts--for however many great painters the English
have produced the fact remains that our only national art--except
perhaps the school of Reynolds and a tradition of landscape
painting--is, still, _literature_; as it always has been. It is nothing
to us that a national memorial is not conceived on nearly such large or
costly lines as are our drapery stores. This causes us no concern
whatever; we get what we want--economy of public money; and what we
deserve--unworthy memorials. To the present-day public the function of
the artist is of small importance--his work is there to amuse us, to
flatter our vanity, to decorate our hideous houses (with which we are
well content) and, when he is dead, to afford us the mild excitement of
a little speculative buying. With such a point of view we can produce no
great school in art. Nothing can change us except we change ourselves.
Gallant attempts to change us have been made by individuals: Ruskin, in
proclaiming one of the world’s great painters, sought to instil some
fire of art into our flaccid hearts--and what happened? We pretended to
desire great things; we became sentimental about the “beauties of
nature” and our insincere desires produced a school of hucksters--who
profaned the work of their master and sullied the beauties of nature.
* * * * *
Where a country has no national art the message of its great men, when
they come, has to be completed just so far as they can take it in their
own lifetime; for it is carried no further by those who follow them;
whereas, when art is national, all its forms “interact. From the
building of a great temple to the outline of a bowl which the potter
turns upon his wheel, _all effort is transfused with a single style_,”
and the message of a great man may take centuries to achieve its
completion and fullness in a progressive unfoldment in evolution.
* * * * *
So many of the greatest drawings of the old masters were done in chalk
that it is sometimes difficult to find examples executed in pen or
pencil that will bring their work within the scope of this book; but in
the _Family of Thomas More_ we have an example of Holbein’s pen drawing
which could not be better for our purpose. It is obviously _the
carefully thought out design for a painting of considerable size_ and,
like all Holbein’s portraits, is a most intimate and searching study of
psychology. Composition drawings (and this one is a good example) are
among the most valuable to us of all works of art. Valuable because the
composition sketches of a great man are generally pure inspiration
throughout. In them he has worked too rapidly to be conscious of his
method--he has been as unconscious as a writer is of his hand-writing.
Napoleon said:
“Inspiration is the instantaneous solution of a long meditated
problem”; what more perfect description could one have of a
composition sketch, for the artist does, as a rule, meditate a
problem for a long time but the moment he finds the solution he
sets down his idea with the greatest zest seizing the first thing
to hand--generally a pen or a pencil. Moreover, in the first rapid
sketch that records his inspiration his mental vision is clear; the
interruptions--inevitable in the slow process of painting a
picture--having not yet occurred.
This book abounds with examples of sketches done in this way. They may
have been done thus, only as a means to an end, but that end is often
more nearly reached in the “instantaneous solution” than in the finished
picture that follows--though we may prize this for many other qualities.
[Sidenote: _Rembrandt_]
Rembrandt above all others delighted in setting down his ideas in this
way; and there are still in existence nearly nine hundred of these vital
drawings of his. I think I shall not be contradicted when I say that the
method by which these Rembrandt sketches were produced defies analysis:
they are not outline drawings, nor are they drawings of light (like
Daumier’s sketches), they are a kind of pictorial calligraphy--as Sir
Charles Holmes once pointed out--closely allied to the Japanese method
of brush drawing, though they are infinitely more varied and are not a
set of symbols constantly rearranged and adjusted for each new problem;
as is often the case in Japanese drawings; and also in the case of our
modern illustrators--who serve up again and again a few threadbare
receipts for hats, boots, facial expressions and so forth. With these
draughtsmen the line has all the hardness that one would expect from the
use of a metal point; the quill pen is incomparably a more sympathetic
instrument than the metal pen, and it is to be hoped that, as methods of
reproduction improve (and they are improving) draughtsmen will again
take to using the quill.
Rembrandt has shown us that the quill or reed pen can give a more
flexible line than any other instrument or medium (except perhaps a
brush) that the artist has at his disposal. Even chalk has not quite the
same possibilities in this particular respect, because the point is
continually crumbling as it is worn away, and the pencil--so suitable
for crisp or delicate work--cannot be used for emphatic statement
without the risk of happening upon that heavy quality that is so
unpleasant.
* * * * *
It is at about this stage that I feel some sort of an essay on drawings
and drawing in general is expected of me. However, as I do not expect it
of myself it is not likely to happen; and he who does must, I fear, be
disappointed. I hold the opinion, as I have already said, that a drawing
is a thing to be looked at and not written about and I therefore content
myself with the simple statement that _a drawing is a symbolic
arrangement of marks made by an intelligent person with a pointed
instrument on a more or less plain surface_. Now, though these three
essentials--the symbology, the arrangement and the intelligence of the
person--may all be excellent, the question of whether he may claim to be
really a draughtsman or why and when he may not be allowed any such
claim will ultimately always be decided by _the quality of the marks_;
in a drawing these are more usually curved lines; but to decide whether
they have the right quality or the wrong quality is a matter most
subtle, eclectic and erudite.
[Sidenote: _Hans Holbein the Younger_]
In Manchester, and the north of England generally, business men call an
artist’s personal style in drawing and design “his handwriting.” And
indeed the phrase has a nice aptness, for the quality of a man’s line in
pen or pencil work is as personal to himself and as unlike another’s as
is his calligraphy--and, like it, may charm or offend us. However--no
one ever has had any doubt about the charm and rightness of the quality
of Holbein’s lines.... “These are no imitations of classic suggestion
_but a new creation on parallel lines_ ... there are men who can create
with the same _naïveté_ and beauty as the Ionians. And let it be noted,
too, that these curves ... are the farthest removed in all art from the
insipidity of the Renaissance flourishes, which we sometimes teach as a
poisonous miasma in our art schools. These are curves of extreme
tension, as of substances pulled out lengthwise with force that has
found its utmost resistance, lines of strain, long _cool_ curves of
vital springing, that bear the strength of their intrinsic unity in
their rhythms.” So wrote Ernest Fenollosa--one of the few great writers
on art. He was not writing about Holbein, but how well he might have
been! What an admirable commentary it makes on the drawings of this
master draughtsman--“curves of extreme tension ... _cool_ curves of
vital springing.” ... Look at the drawings of the _Duchess of Suffolk_;
_Thomas Watt_; _Bishop Fisher_ or the _Family of Thomas More_
(reproduced here, p. 29) or any other portrait drawing by Holbein and I
think it cannot but be agreed that it is a perfect description of that
most difficult thing to describe--Holbein’s line. It must be admitted
that Holbein as a decorator seems to have been a different
being--“Renaissance flourishes” were then his stock in trade; they
sprout from every available excrescence. But most fortunately, in his
portraits, he had no use for the flourish; and here we are only
concerned with his portrait drawings.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: _Michelangelo_]
One cannot study Michelangelo without realizing or at any rate
suspecting that _all presentment of psychology essentially depends upon
proportions, subtly observed_; and though one cannot expect a master in
an art school to allow his pupils to draw the model in inaccurate
proportions as a general rule he might, one thinks, occasionally with
advantage--say one day a week--order them to decide in their minds first
what type, psychologically, they most wish to suggest by the human
figure and to think out, then, _what proportions_ would best convey the
idea of it--deliberately falsifying, where necessary, the proportions of
the model to achieve their purpose. The proportions in a Michelangelo
drawing are _not_, accurately, those in a human figure. But, by a
general concensus of opinion, they are accepted as suggesting a
psychology more divine than human. This then must have been
Michelangelo’s intention. How did he do it. If we cannot learn the
secret by studying his drawings we have little else to help us except
the following cryptic receipt, that legend tells us came from him, and
which has still remained undeciphered--“a figure should be pyramidal,
serpentine, and _multiplied by one two and three_.” Is there any
connection between it and the occultists’ formula--“the one becomes two,
the two three, and the three seven,” and their axiom that “Seven is the
perfect Number”?
The principle of selecting deliberately where the proportions shall be
inaccurate to observed fact, for the purpose of suggesting a desired
type, is not unlike the principle that Rodin used to convey the idea of
action in a figure:--he taught that movement could best be suggested by
including in the pose at least two more or less instantaneous positions
or movements which _could_ not, accurately, occur _simultaneously_ in a
human figure.
That standard of excellence in art--that a picture or statue should “be
true to life”--has befogged too many of us. Art is in its essence and in
its finality--_artificial_. And proficiency is nothing if the obvious,
the non-essential and the trivial have been relied on to convey the
artist’s idea.
Reproductions of Michelangelo’s and Holbein’s finest drawings are
usually hung in most art schools--as examples of how to draw I suppose.
But, with curious inconsistency, the masters teach their students to do
it by a system of straight-line-scaffolding known as _blocking in_; a
method that has never been used by any of the greater draughtsmen, but
which was, I believe, imported from Paris in the ’seventies or
’eighties; as an antidote, no doubt, to the “poisonous miasma” that
Fenollosa condemns! However, competent draughtsmen are, of course,
produced by art schools here, as in other countries in considerable
numbers, but it is scarcely a debatable point that what modern art most
lacks is _tradition_. Present day conditions make the old system of
apprenticeship almost impossible--students are too numerous and the
artists too varied and contradictory in their opinions for any workable
system of apprenticeship to continue. The few attempts that are made in
this direction usually come to an unsatisfactory end. And so tradition
is dead or lost. The system as it was practised in the days of the
Renaissance--in conserving tradition--was of immense value to the
continuous progress of art; but in these days the student is thrust from
the art school into the world to make his way--as innocent of
traditions as a newly-hatched sparrow is of feathers. He is equipped
with the experience and opinions of his fellow students and the maxims
that are the stock in trade of the professional art-master; who--though
he is sometimes a real teacher and even an inspired and inspiring
teacher--is far more often merely an artist earning his living by
instructing his pupils in a system that he has himself evolved, and
which he is quite unable to demonstrate has ever been used by any great
draughtsman or painter.
To quote an example--no doubt an extreme case but a fairly typical
one--the student will be shown, as I have already said, a fine Holbein
drawing, and urged to emulate and study it with the closest attention;
but to do so he is given a blunt stick of charcoal and a piece of white
machine-made paper and initiated into a system of indicating
measurements and directions with heavy black lines. It is implied that
all the great masters began their careers by working in this way though,
for obvious reasons, no proof of this can ever be produced. It is
further implied that if he will apply himself to the art-master’s method
with real zeal he will in time be able to produce drawings like Holbein,
Ingres or Leonardo. If the student is a natural draughtsman he
invariably breaks away from the art school’s set of rules; and the
master generally has wit enough to let him go his own way. But the
others--well the others generally learn later in life with some
bitterness how they have been duped; unless they have had the good
fortune to be the pupils of Mr. Walter Sickert or Professor Tonks--who
both really have traditions from the old masters.
It would be wiser and better that the proprietors and governors of most
of our art schools should say frankly--“we cannot teach drawing as the
great draughtsmen were taught, we teach a fairly serviceable method of
drawing which it must be clearly understood is intended to be painted
over.” However--their system of teaching drawing seems to be much
sounder than their system of teaching painting.
At this point I want to say too, that though the word “rhythm” is often
uttered in the schools very little that is useful or illuminating is
taught there about this most subtle and essential quality in art.
Essential in drawing, in line, in spacing, in chiaroscuro and in
composition. It is always present in the work of the greater masters.
Curiously enough, too, it is often the one quality that causes a lesser
man to hold rank among them. A drawing can hardly be stated by one line,
usually it needs many, and rhythm is the principle whereby the
draughtsman can make a number of complex statements in a drawing
synthetically an harmonious whole. It is by rhythm that every line is
related to every other line: they have the same relation to each other
on the paper as dancers have one to another in a ballet. When a
ballet--such as _The Humorous Ladies_--has been danced to its
conclusion, though there may have been many movements, each and all
were in sympathy with each other and with the main theme.
Rhythm is, I think, the secret of the charm or power in the work of
artists as widely different as M. Leon Bakst, Lovat Fraser and Claude
Shepperson.
The modern art school seems to be a sort of clearing house for the
elimination of the student who thinks the life of an artist more
attractive than--say--life in an office. This type predominates in
practically all art schools. He (or she) is intensely serious about
being an artist, but is not seriously interested in art. After a period
more or less prolonged, this kind of neophyte discovers that the work of
an artist is not materially assisted by sombrero hats, flowing ties,
bobbed hair, corduroy trousers, fancy-dress dances, views about free
love, all night discussions about ethics--and so on, one need not
continue the familiar list. Having, I say, discovered that the most
assiduous cultivation of these exciting manners and customs does not
constitute the life of an artist this neophyte drops out of the race, as
far as the art world is concerned, and disappears. Years of hard work
and perhaps actual privation were not in his contract with the Muse, at
least--he did not notice the clause! If that hard-work business was the
game then no candle was worth it! Is there any harm done. As far as the
unserious student is concerned, I suppose there may have been some good,
but his effect on the art school is wholly bad. It makes anything
approaching to the old system of apprenticeship impossible; and we have
any number of proofs that this old system was the right one.
* * * * *
Whether art is national or personal in its message there is no doubt
that its artists are a peculiar people; they consist of two kinds (but
many sects): one--the craftsman--has a mission to create exquisite
things and the other has a mission to see exquisitely and to teach
others to see exquisitely too. It is not possible to predict what new
thing the craftsman will next make beautiful or what new thing the
artist will next interpret as beautiful. They are inspired by a spirit
that bloweth where it listeth. How great the power of this spirit in us
still is is proved by the astonishing number of unlovely things that
have been lately revealed to the world as beautiful, through the
mysterious alchemic process of this spirit of vision working in the
artist. But the spirit of inspiration did not always work thus. Some
centuries ago--when we had not so long emerged from Greek thought and
the influence of Plato--the process was almost the reverse. It required
that the artist should first see beautifully on the plane of ideas some
mental conception and then give it birth in a material form. In those
days the æsthetic sense was the guiding intelligence that moulded man’s
civilization and environment. In other words art produced the
environment that produced the artist. Communing with the spirit, the
artist, looking inward and not out, sought his subject in his own mind
or soul; and only through his art did it become an objective reality for
others. But now, to-day, the æsthetic principle no longer moulds our
civilization; has but a negligible influence even on our thought and no
effect upon the practical affairs of life. We train our workers to live
and labour without a knowledge even that such principles exist or that
in past ages such ideas _controlled the growth of nations_.
That era is now closed, for “no phase or school of art in human society,
however beautiful, but contains within itself the germs of its own
destruction.” From the beauty of the past comes the grim battle-field of
to-day--where we wage our keen struggle for existence. Governments
cannot be taking architecture seriously when they are too out-at-elbows
to find housing accommodation for their populations--even in thea
meanest huts. And so it follows that their smaller buildings--such as
their post-offices, labour exchange bureaus, etcetera--are quite
unashamedly practical; in the most commonplace sense. Meanly designed
and economically executed to the lowest contractor’s tender, ignoring
even the simple, strong beauty that can be achieved merely by mechanical
efficiency (except recently in a few local housing schemes) they hedge
us about on all sides against the old æsthetic sense. Dimly we are aware
that we have lost that guiding intelligence--the spirit of art--that
lighted the path for our forefathers; and shamelessly we ignore all the
wealth of tradition we inherited from the preceding eras of their
greatness.
And the artist--has lost his inner vision. And in his place a new one
has been evolved; one who is equal to the task that we have set him: he
paints--not ideas but--life as he finds it; he paints experiences; he
records emotions; if he receives a visual shock--he cannot make enough
haste to do a picture recording it; for to him it is a psychological
experience and therefore supremely worth recording. We here set him
about with evils and surround him with the sordid and ostentatious; the
spirit working in him by a new alchemy has called evil good; what will
happen to the world if he should forget and call good evil! Let us hope
rather that the spirit of vision--guiding him now to look outward on the
visible world for his subject--will inspire him to penetrate the
darkness of the æsthetic desert we have set about him; and that--again
communing with the spirit--he will give us--not, as before, ideals from
his own mental psychology but--see for us and reveal to us finely the
mass-psychology of mankind. But it is not possible to prophesy what the
art of the future may be that mankind of the future will approve.
* * * * *
France has now no national art--save her sense of humour (and we all
know to what she turns infallibly for stimulation in that!) but she does
know a great man when she produces one; nor does she confound him with
a lesser artist, however much excitement she may indulge in in making a
passing fashion of the latter: her pride in Puvis de Chavannes does not
waver. She has recently had some men of genius, and they are typically
French, but can we accept them as having founded a national art in
France? No--for we experience the fact that the truths that Cézanne, Van
Gogh and Gauguin came to teach are no truer for restatement by their
disciples, nor have they been further illuminated for us by the endless
repetitions of their personal conventions. But the astonishing fact is
now being daily insisted upon by some among us that the art of these
Frenchmen _is_ national to England!
* * * * *
England once came near to having a national art--in the school of
Reynolds, Gainsborough, Romney and Lawrence. At any rate their work,
reproduced in coloured-engravings by men almost their equal, did reach
the people in response to their demand for it and so became at least a
_national tradition_; brilliant but all short-lived.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: _Joseph Crawhall_]
Ultimately it is the love of the people that alike crowns the king or
acclaims the artist, and until this happens no artist can be sure of a
prominent rank among the great; however much seeming popularity he may
enjoy in his lifetime. But there are reasons why an artist is sometimes
not given the rank he deserves until long after he should be--apart from
those supplied by the uncatholic point of view engendered in the people
by lack of education and the jealousy engendered in his contemporary
artists by their struggle for recognition. For instance--he may complete
very little work; or else his work may not be seen or known except to a
few private collectors and dealers, who are wisely but selfishly
exploiting it commercially; thus the recognition of his work by the
public may be retarded, for the simple fact that it does not know of its
existence: as in the case of Joseph Crawhall, who, when his work is
known, will undoubtedly be given the high rank he deserves and become as
famous to the public as he is now to the collector. I do not hesitate to
prophesy this in spite of the fact that I once heard one of our best
known critics state with considerable fervour that he wished Crawhall
had destroyed _all_ he had ever done instead of only what he did destroy
(probably nearly or quite half his work).
An artist as a rule lives by selling his work and though the fact that
works of art are articles of commerce may delay or accelerate the
verdict on him it will not ultimately affect it. These things are on the
knees of the gods; for though he, in his lifetime, may receive from
educated people a concensus of approval, posterity may yet reverse the
judgment. He may have been approved because his work was bought, and his
work may have been bought for much the same reason that some persons
back horses. In fact there is a certain resemblance between the two. In
the art world, as on the race-course, the favourites are obvious and
expensive; and, to continue the analogy, outsiders have a most
unexpected way of turning out to be winners. But here the analogy must
end--for a dead artist may be a little gold-mine whereas a dead
racehorse is merely cat’s-meat. Michelangelo is still a winner: it is
interesting to know that reproductions of his drawings are, to-day, sold
in far larger numbers than are the reproductions of any other man. To
the student of drawing he is still a god and, because of his superhuman
ability to draw, he lives in the student’s mind in a divine halo.
With regard to works of art considered as speculative investments I
offer the following advice: be sure you know a good drawing when you see
one, and buy a man’s drawings when he is young. To wait until he has
proved himself as a painter before accepting him as a draughtsman is,
economically, a bad principle. He--the now arrived painter--will
multiply the original price of his early drawings by twenty and pocket
his just but belated reward. Belated, because it would have been far
more valuable to him in the early days of his career to have sold the
same drawings for smaller sums when, probably, money was hard to come by
and may have meant much in the completion of his training. And the
drawings will probably be as good as any he will ever do; for, later in
life, when drawing is practised with a view to painting, the results are
generally more summary and, though frequently more masterly, they seldom
have quite the same sincerity as those done early in life, when--as a
rule forbidden by his teacher to paint--he will put into his drawings
the whole of his best endeavour and aim at creating a drawing that shall
be a complete work of art in itself; with the result that these early
productions are often “arrived” works of art, with a special beauty and
interest of their own, even before he has emerged from the student stage
himself.
[Sidenote: _Augustus John_]
There are many instances of this among the old and modern masters. Among
the latter there is Mr. Augustus John, who, while still at the Slade
School, produced drawings that proved him to be a great draughtsman; and
though his recent drawings may be the product of maturity--they may be
finger-posts, as it were, to new and original fields of art--they have
demonstrated the fact no more forcibly than did his early work.
* * * * *
Certain collectors, of course, have been fully alive to this point about
the work of young artists, and those who acquired some of the early
drawings of our greater men a few years ago must now be congratulating
themselves on their discernment; also on their astuteness--for they
probably acquired these masterpieces for absurdly small sums.
It is the public rather than the collector who has been slow to realize
the decorative value and charm of drawings. Is it confusing them with
the large, bloodless engravings of the Victorian dining-room? If so, it
is a pity; for drawings are a most fitting form of wall decoration for
small rooms: in their slight suggestion of subtle colour they harmonize
admirably with plain distemper walls--decorating without being
obtrusive--they take their place quietly in the scheme of the room.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: _Dürer_]
But to return to the old masters.... Dürer’s work is essentially and
typically German, and reveals the old German spirit at its best--as it
was in its romantic age before Luther. To study Dürer’s drawings is to
become convinced of the truth of mediæval legend: mystical symbology--in
passing through the crucible of his mind--issues thence established as
historic fact; and it would be as true to say of him that historic
fact--passing through the same crucible--becomes mystically symbolic. In
everything he did one feels that the primary interest of each drawing
for him lay always in a metaphysical, religious or philosophical idea.
In all of them there is what Whistler condemned as out of place, in a
picture, and called, “the literary quality.” If Taine, the Frenchman, be
right, he puts Whistler’s argument out of court; for Taine is convinced
that the artist’s whole _raison d’être_ and mission is to present and
interpret to the people _in a simple language that they can understand_
the philosophical and other ideas they desire but cannot formulate for
themselves. Under the old spirit of art the artist undoubtedly did
recognize this as his mission, whereas to-day he often contents
himself--like the modern playwright--by presenting the people with
problems, in the hope perhaps that they will supply him with the
solutions at which he has not yet himself arrived; and by believing that
the intellectual exercise involved may be as educative for them as were
the methods of the earlier masters. At any rate Dürer’s works stand as a
formidable monument to the rightness of Taine’s theory. Certainly in the
art of illustrating ideas it would be difficult to find anyone to
surpass Dürer; or to surpass him in his fine sense of how to decorate a
page. But throughout his work one feels a lack of any sense of humour;
and also, perhaps of spontaneity. If genius is an infinite capacity for
taking pains--then Dürer was a genius. In all his work there is an
immense sincerity; and this carries him to great heights in some of his
religious drawings--for instance in that superb wood-cut of his of
Christ praying in the Garden of Gethsemane.
[Sidenote: _Leonardo da Vinci_]
It would be misleading to say that there was much in common in the
outlook of Dürer and Leonardo and yet I am tempted to point out that
there was a certain similarity, in spite of the fact that the vision of
the latter was infinitely more gracious; at any rate they both included
caricature and architectural draughtsmanship among their arts; and both
were interested in mathematics and science.
* * * * *
What a strange race of supermen might be evolved if science and art
could combine to give birth to a progeny in which the essence of both
were equally mingled. Once upon a time by some miracle of the Gods and
Muses such essences were so mingled, and a son was brought to birth
whose doings were an astonishment and delight to his contemporaries and
whose work was a record and proof of the success of the experiment. But
the experiment was not repeated, and one may hazard a guess which Muse
it was said “A most successful and unexpected result; add the data to
the sum of human knowledge and let us proceed to the next experiment on
our schedule!”
And the most artistic of scholars and the most scholastic of artists
remains a lonely figure, for whom we can find no comparison: a
fascinating enigma for the race.
He not only astounded and delighted his contemporaries but each
succeeding generation; nor have we yet measured the extent of the
knowledge materialized in the work of Leonardo da Vinci.
The _creative_ artist is not satisfied with an intellectual grasp of a
truth, for his aim must always be to translate abstract ideas into form;
to clothe his thought in a visible or aural body. To the mind of the
scholar, though, he must appear a most practical, almost utilitarian
being--one who does not regard the acquirement of knowledge as an end
sufficient in itself! Leonardo da Vinci combined in his personality the
genius of both types. His scientific drawings are full of the finest
æsthetic feeling; his æsthetic drawings are a marvel to the scientist.
He had a passionate love of research, and the fact that he left so few
completed paintings must be attributed to his having devoted so much of
his energy to research. He did, however, leave great numbers of drawings
that, by common consent, are ranked among the greatest achievements in
art. They are the unique records of one of the noblest minds the race
has produced--that of a supreme master of creative art.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: _Daumier_]
I always think of Daumier as of a man going through the dark and crowded
streets of a city holding a lighted lamp and thrusting it into dusty
corners. And of him shaking with Gargantuan laughter--while he watches
the antics of the strange people he discovers--and penetrating with a
glance to the very depths of their pathetic and ridiculous souls. But
while his pencil mocks them his great heart loves them!
I have heard it asserted that Daumier drew like a sculptor, but I think
it would be nearer the truth to say that in his finest drawings he is
concerned first and last and all the time with _light_. For him this was
scarcely a limitation: the light rays are gathered by the point of his
pencil and fixed--by some alchemic process of his will on the paper--to
glow there for our satisfaction as long as his drawings endure. Whereas,
in a sculptor’s drawings, light is but a means to an end (he would carve
the paper if he could!) he throws lines like measuring cords round the
form--each a statement of some measurement of contour--and having
established in this way a mass, he is able to take from it the elevation
of all subsidiary and related forms with, one might say, his mental
calipers. A process of drawing widely different from that practised by
Daumier.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: _Ingres_]
One cannot help feeling that, to this aristocrat of French artists, a
display of emotions in a drawing would have been a most unclassic and
plebeian sign of weakness. And one seems to know that in Ingres’ art of
pure unemotional drawing--his eye measured, his brain commanded, his
hand obeyed and the pencil glided from one position to the next by the
most direct path, a curve so slight as to be almost straight; leaving
its grey immaculate line to prove its absolute obedience to the
draughtsman’s will ... and so the drawing would grow without an
unnecessary stroke or a correction; simply the unfoldment of a
preconception carried out according to plan and justly recording his
penetrating analysis of a subject.
The guiding star and strength of Ingres’ genius was his conviction that
he could not err.
M. Anatole France tells a characteristic story of an encounter with
Ingres in his own youth:--he was at the opera one evening, the house was
full and not an empty seat was to be seen. Suddenly an impressive
looking stranger stepped up to him and said “Young man, give me your
seat--I am Monsieur Ingres.”
How consistent the great man was! From his earliest youth he appears to
have never doubted himself or his work; there was calm assurance in
everything he did.
Elsewhere in these notes I have referred to the fact that artists often
do their finest drawings early in life, and here we happen on one of the
young men of whom I wrote: Ingres did some of his finest drawings twenty
or thirty years before he painted his most famous pictures. That
marvellous drawing--_The Stamaty Family_--is dated 1818, and the _Lady
with Sunshade_--as perfect a portrait drawing as could well be
imagined--was done in 1813; and many fine drawings earlier still;
whereas his famous picture _La Source_ was painted in 1856, and many of
his best known pictures were done in the period between 1840 and 1866.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: _Cotman_]
Cotman is another man of whom one feels tempted to say--in studying his
work--that one cannot see any signs in it that he ever mistrusted the
rightness of his aims and methods. It is customary to write of Cotman’s
life as both unhappy and unsuccessful, but instead it should be borne in
mind that he did have success of the best kind--he was immensely
successful in painting what he wanted to paint; and no artist can have a
success more dear to him than that. His methods were most consistent,
and so it is probable that--disgusted with a world that only required
his services as a drawing-master--he pursued his own way and managed to
be as happy as any other genius in the practice of his art.
Until very recently his name was generally mentioned with three or four
of his contemporary water-colour painters--as though there were not much
to choose between the batch; but gradually the weight of public opinion
is proclaiming the conviction that Cotman was a head and shoulders above
the group with which he has been catalogued; and year by year the
appreciation of his work grows in volume. His position, however, is
still not recognized as, I am convinced, it will be in a few years time.
His method of painting was so widely different to Turner’s that the
public and the critics--dazzled by the sunsets of “our greatest
painter”--have been slow indeed to recognize the originality and
distinction of Cotman’s genius. As a draughtsman of landscapes he
excelled in lyrical beauty and perfection of technical accomplishment;
but his paintings should be studied with his drawings, for it is in
these that he showed his real originality--producing paintings that are
comparable, _as decorations_, with the prints of the greater Japanese
wood-engravers; and at a time, it should be remembered, when these
prints were unknown in Europe.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: _Beardsley_]
“He became a sort of household word”--so wrote Mr. Robert Ross in his
readable little book on Beardsley.
A description of Beardsley’s reputation more wide of the mark I cannot
imagine. Beardsley is really one of England’s “skeletons in the
cupboard.” The average Englishman is somewhat ashamed of Beardsley as a
fellow countryman, he feels there has been some mistake--the fellow
ought to have been a Czecho-Slovac! To think that the year 1872 (a most
respectable year!) should have brought to light this utterly un-English
phenomenon is not pleasing to him. I have seen more than one young
English student embarrassed and somewhat annoyed when an enthusiastic
Frenchman has congratulated him on being a compatriot of that “great
genius Aubrey Beardsley.” All the world over Beardsley is still “caviare
to the general” and particularly to the English general. He is
acceptable enough when his ideas are popularized by other artists:
throughout France and America whole schools of present day illustrators
are founded on his work; and he is rightly acknowledged as the “old
master” of mechanical line engraving. He was the first artist to
understand really and utilize to the full the possibilities of this
process of reproduction; and--as so often happens with the first man to
use a process intelligently--he carried it further and found it less
restricting than any who have followed him.
Beardsley had an immense power of technical invention--like Hokusai, he
was able to bring any subject of his choice within the scope of his
convention, and to render it in a way that was perfect for the process
by which his work was to be reproduced.
There is an ironical beauty in everything he ever did, and his
compositions--regarded as an adjustment of spaces--are more
consistently original and daring than those of any other Western artist,
old or modern; only in the East can we find his equal in this particular
expression of creative art.
The shock that Beardsley gave to British feelings was, I fancy, due far
more to the intrinsic originality of his compositions than to the
“nautiness,” imagined or real, in his drawings, about which we have
heard so much. It is surely a case of _honi soit qui mal y pense_, for
there is nothing in the books of drawings by Aubrey Beardsley that are
published in this country that could offend a school miss.
Mr. G. K. Chesterton’s _Father Brown_ says in one of his adventures “Its
the wrong shape in the abstract. Don’t you ever feel that about Eastern
art? The colours are intoxicatingly lovely; but the shapes are mean and
bad--deliberately mean and bad. I have seen wicked things in a Turkey
carpet.” Well, _Father Brown’s_ remark is illuminating, for not only are
there wicked shapes in Turkey carpets but, however “beautifully seen”
the rest of a Beardsley drawing is, the drawing _of the faces_ in it is
often _deliberately mean and bad_. But I think, also, that it would have
been more just of _Father Brown_ to have completed his remark with the
“finish” that “is an added truth” by saying that he had never seen a
wicked shape in a Persian carpet. This generalization about Eastern art
and “the wrong shape in the abstract” makes one fear that perhaps the
champion of Mr. Bateman might be no friend to Beardsley; and I regret to
think that Mr. Chesterton might not champion Eastern shapes; or
Beardsley--though I can understand his not doing so: I venerate him as
the British lion and therefore it seems but natural that he should wage
perpetual war against the unicorn--and doubtless he might regard
Beardsley as a fabulous beast. The British feeling is strong about
shapes--an Englishman likes to recognize a shape instantly; should he
fail to do so he really is extremely uncomfortable and affronted and
will, as often as not, turn on the creator of the “wrong shape” and
accuse him of ungentlemanly conduct.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: _Phil May_]
At any rate the British public has always accepted as final _Mr.
Punch’s_ opinion on matters of humour. He has given it an almost
unbroken tradition--which is more than can be said of any other
institution of English art--and it is grateful. When he imported from
Australia the brilliant draughtsman Phil May it took the newcomer to its
bosom without any hesitation--and he has nestled there ever since. But
the artworld--so-called--though on quite good terms with _Mr. Punch_
does not always accept his opinion unquestioned: it has been known to
make invidious comparisons between his paper and _Jugend_ or _Le Rire_,
and has even gone so far as to attempt wit at his expense; as in the
case of the gentleman who said _Punch_ is “written by Mr. Pickwick, for
Mr. Pickwick about Mr. Pickwick”--which was rude and surely lacking in
the deference due to our elderly purveyor of humour! However, in the
matter of Phil May, _Mr. Punch_ scored handsomely, and persons, even
with the highest brows, have accepted his drawings _con amore_.
Phil May’s drawings look the most spontaneous things imaginable--and no
doubt this is true of their humour--but his method of drawing was an
elaborate process of elimination. The execution of a rather finished
pencil drawing was the first stage of his work--in this he elaborated
all the characteristics that his keen eye and ready humour had
observed--and the final stage was calligraphic in character and
displayed his genius for simplification. With a few deft strokes of the
pen--disposed with an almost uncanny knowledge of essentials--he made
what appeared to be--when the careful pencil work was rubbed out--a most
spontaneous sketch. In truth, it was no such thing, but an intellectual
exercise in the eclectic art of elimination arrived at by means exactly
opposite to those usually employed by artists who seek spontaneity in
their work. Phil May understood the English people and they understood
Phil May. His humour synchronized with the public of his day--as did the
work of Rowlandson in another age and probably, like his, it will be
prized as a record of a period, as well as for its intrinsic value as
the work of a most original draughtsman.
The witty line is most often the brief line, but though Phil May’s line
was not always a brief one it never failed to be a witty one.
* * * * *
The Englishman has probably the finest collection of drawings that has
ever been brought together in one place. It is housed in an excellent
museum built for its accommodation and placed in charge of the finest
experts that can be found. It is further ordained that if the Englishman
wishes to inspect his treasures he shall do so in the greatest possible
comfort. No guest of a Sultan could look at his host’s collection of,
let us say, Persian miniatures, in more luxury than can
the-man-in-the-street look at his own collection of drawings in the
_Print Room_ of the British Museum; patient and courteous persons wait
on his every whim; and expert opinion, should he require it, is imparted
to him without a smile or hint of impatience at his ignorance. In short,
everything is done to coax him to a study of his collections except one
thing--and that is to inform him that he possesses these treasures.
I think the attention of the Trustees of the British and other Museums
might be drawn to the fact that the-man-in-the-street cannot know about
his priceless possessions unless someone informs him. The assumption
that the information is imparted to him in early youth by his parents is
erroneous. He may well live and die, and frequently does, without
knowing what the words _Print Room_ stand for. The question of how to
inform him if he does not know might be left in the hands of one who is
an expert in the art of reaching his intelligence. True, the notice
boards of our Museums might then assume a somewhat jaunty air, offensive
to the grave habitués--this is what might greet them and what they might
not like: “Come where it’s always bright! Free! Now showing all day in
the _Print Room_. The finest collection of drawings in the world:
Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci, supported by an allstar company of
draughtsmen! Central heating! Perfect ventilation!” But the habitués
would doubtless come back to their haunts after a few days’
disgusted abstention from their habits and--what is more
important--the-man-in-the-street would now be the-man-in-the-Print-Room.
I am aware that the subject I am required to write about is _Pen and
Pencil Drawings_, and I have faith that I shall come to it but--being
filled with a desire to write about chalk drawings, charcoal drawings,
paintings, the-man-in-the-street, and all manner of things relevant and
irrelevant--I need to remind myself of it. Even then I may come to my
subject by a route not unlike that taken by Mr. William Caine in his
essay on _Cats_: he began, he continued and he went on to the end in an
unbroken eulogy on dogs and their admirable qualities viewed from all
angles, and then summed up and dismissed his subject for ever with this
line: “Cats have none of these characteristics.”
I shall, then, continue my aberrant course with the remark that I am
constantly struck by the fact, in most exhibitions, that in half the
pictures there either the subject is too small to deserve a picture or
the picture is too large for its subject. The first is an error of taste
and the second an error of _scale_.
The pleasure we derive from a sense of the fitness and rightness of the
scale of a picture may be only common-sense but it is certainly lacking
in many painters, especially in the average painter of modern
“exhibition pictures.” In these so often there are great spaces of
merely tinted canvas which serve no really useful or legitimate purpose;
and do not even contribute to the scheme of the picture as a decoration.
Sometimes, possibly, this coloured canvas may suggest a sense of space
and bigness but it is a rather obvious expedient and it fails to be
impressive if one compares it with the sense of spaciousness that has
been conveyed to one often by a few square inches of paper in a drawing.
Fortunately, as a rule, big pictures nowadays are generally painted for
exhibitions--just as fat-stock is reared to be shown at a particular
agricultural show: the show over--the fat-stock is hastily conveyed to
the nearest butcher. But the fate of the big picture is rather
mysterious and I will not suggest what I think really happens to it, for
after all I may be quite wrong. Certainly in France though, where the
output of big pictures is double or treble that of this country, their
post-exhibition fate is fairly obvious: the great majority of French
houses are incapable of accommodating these Salon triumphs, and it is
the rarest thing to find one of these huge canvases in the houses of
the rich and ostentatious _bourgeois_. Happily for the draughtsman he is
not tempted to work on the heroic scale so that--when the swing of the
pendulum may have placed his work temporarily or permanently out of
fashion--his work can usually be accommodated in a portfolio; for the
size of a drawing is generally regulated by the medium employed.
However, as genius may ignore custom, habit and even existing rules of
good taste, someone--with a right to the title--may come along and do
silverpoint drawings on ten-foot sheets of paper--just as a famous
modern etcher is doing plates of a size absolutely forbidden by the
professors, and yet everyone--except a few contemporary etchers--admits
them to be masterly.
The _official_ picture could and should be a human document, but this it
can hardly be if all humorous side-lights are rigidly excluded in
it--however serious the affairs it purports to present. The old masters
knew human nature, therefore in their paintings of ceremonial affairs
they did not forget to touch delicately on its weaknesses, even
sometimes accenting these as comic-relief. Though I would not be so rash
as to suggest the desirability of comic-relief in our _official_
pictures, I am tempted to think that relief of some kind would be well
received.
Another point about the _official_ picture is that it is generally very
large and is, as a rule, about the dullest product of the brush; for the
average modern painter when called upon to perform in this way generally
becomes simply overwhelmed with deep seriousness. He designs his picture
in the most pompous and formal manner and produces results either boring
or unintentionally funny, which latter is perhaps the more tolerable.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: _William Orpen_]
Not so with Sir William Orpen--his keen sense of humour is apparent in
all his work, whether he is painting tone studies of mirrors at
Versailles or drawing his friends on the rocky coasts of Ireland. It is
one of the many charms that delight us in his work and does not detract
an iota from its distinction and importance. Some of his exquisite
drawings are reproduced here, and though the full purity of the line
cannot be retained in reproduction they are some of the perfect things
in this book.
It is a relief to find oneself thinking in terms of “perfection” about
the work of any man so modern as Sir William Orpen. Because, of course,
where the modern draughtsman and painter--as is so commonly the
case--despises his materials and scorns technique it is impossible for
one to do so. The mind--which is so much the product of the senses--must
know distaste where the senses are repelled. One may forgive him because
of other merits in his work, but the merits have to be rather splendid
to cover sufficiently such sins. To Whistler and the stylists who have
followed him much of their inspiration must have come from the materials
of their craft. One is grateful that they grasped this truth that
[Sidenote: _Glyn Philpot_]
the English Pre-Raphaelites also missed--that _rare and delicious
qualities in the handling of a medium best present to the mind rare and
beautiful qualities in nature_. In this sense Mr. Philpot is essentially
a stylist--one feels that to him the intrinsic beauties of his medium
form an appreciable amount of his inspiration: that--quite
literally--common oils and varnishes can be blended to a golden elixir
for his use. For the materials of his craft are for the artist what he
chooses to make them: a piece of red chalk in one man’s hand is a lump
of hardened mud, conveniently sharpened to a point for making marks on
paper, while, to another, it is a precious substance mined from the
earth in some distant country and prepared with infinite care, and he
knows that one touch of it on a paper--most carefully chosen--can be the
basis of a delicious colour-harmony; that ink can flow from a reed pen
in a line straight and true or run its course with subtle
modulations--as a little stream flows from the hills.
A lead pencil after all can be only the bitten stump on the office boy’s
desk--an instrument for unseemly writings or obscene scrawlings; or it
can be a cunningly wrought stick of plumbago encased in a scented
cylinder of cedar--such a thing as Leonardo would have loved. Is not the
artist capable of an alchemy that can change dross to gold!
* * * * *
[Sidenote: _Brangwyn_]
The rewards of the successful artist are many and varied, but the most
coveted, surely--and the least often secured--is the reward of
international fame. The list is not long of the English artists who have
achieved it--indeed it is unjustly short. The English are, themselves,
always generous in their acceptance of foreign artists--even to the
neglect of their own; in this they are unlike other nations,
particularly the French who, though slow to acclaim foreign artists, are
loud-voiced in praise of their own home-grown products. But Mr.
Brangwyn’s name, in spite of this, stands high in Europe. It would
scarcely be an exaggeration to say that his work stands for English
contemporary painting half the world over.
An artist who is painting for an international public distributed in all
parts of the world is not likely to bother himself with artistic
party-politics, and it is noticeable that Mr. Brangwyn does not move
with the ebb and flow of opinion in London. He is not a fashionable
painter and is not ever likely to be. In another age his art might have
produced a new school.
There have, it might be said, been two Rubens in the history of European
art. The first was Peter Paul and the second--Brangwyn.
Rubens (Peter Paul) has been out of fashion since Mr. Sickert made
Tottenham Court Road delightful by teaching us how they paint in Paris,
but Venice seems more interested in how Mr. Brangwyn paints in London.
Fine draughtsman as Mr. Brangwyn is, his drawings always remind us that
he is a painter, and a decorative painter. Curiously enough though, they
scarcely suggest a reserve of strength, in fact on the contrary, for
everything that Mr. Brangwyn has to say is stated--whether in painting
or drawing--with the utmost energy and vigour of his capacity. He gives
generously, freely, without stint from a full brush--he draws from the
shoulder as it were; and that his aim is the decoration of large spaces
in architectural settings is always apparent in his work; and that this
is its usual destiny should be remembered when his drawings are being
studied. It is through the medium of his drawings and sketches that we
have, in these days, to study Mr. Brangwyn’s art, for the large
decorations--destined for public buildings in other countries--on which
he is constantly engaged, leave England (as a rule) without being
exhibited. Doubtless we can add this loss to our list of grudges against
the officials of the painting world, for the public have long ago
realized the importance of Mr. Brangwyn’s position and are justly proud
of him. The psychological interest of his figures is of a basic and
standard kind and generally full of suggestion of forms personal to his
own art.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: _Bateman_]
The difficulty with Mr. Bateman is to take him seriously. Really he is a
most serious phenomenon--and yet the bare mention of his name sets us
chuckling in happy reminiscence and digging each other in the ribs in
cheery anticipation of jokes yet unborn.
It would be doing him but scant justice, really, if we were to give him
some honorary degree--called him Dr. Bateman and sat him in a “chair” at
one of the Universities as Professor of human psychology. Instead we
just go on buying any paper that he happens to be drawing for--and
laughing. But the day may come when he might turn round on us, wearied
of our interminable cackling, and say “Cry you devils, cry!” and then we
shall be sorry--but we shall cry all right: a few little adjustments of
that subtle line of his and the humour we value so highly would become
tragedy.
In England there seems to be a curious tradition that a drawing becomes
funny if it has a funny story printed underneath it; that the expression
on one face in a group of persons if slightly ludicrous makes a drawing
humorous. In a Bateman drawing the drawing is the humour and the humour
is the drawing. Everything is in the same terms throughout. His very
line seems to have a risible ripple in it, for his humour is the real
thing--not irony or satire but the essential spiritual faculty of
perceiving the incongruous wherever it occurs. He has a host of
imitators, abroad as well as in this home circle of islands, but they
are sheep in wolves’ clothing and the joke is not in them--they satirise
the already ridiculous.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: _Muirhead Bone_]
Mr. Muirhead Bone is another artist who has many imitators--some with
considerable technical success--but fortunately an artist’s vision is
his own and no one can borrow his eyes or his soul though they may well
nigh take the pencil from his hand. Of Mr. Bone’s vision much might be
said. It is unique in the art of the time; and in his hand a pencil
becomes a truly magical instrument--like the bow in the hand of a great
violinist: when his pencil has touched the paper one takes a keen
pleasure in each line for its own sake, and when to this is added a full
realization of the interpretation and vision they collectively record,
one may well say--here is a real draughtsman! He endows St. James’s Hall
with such beauty in his drawing of its _Demolition_ that one is tempted
to desire the destruction of several of our buildings.... Imagine what
he would draw for us if we took half the roof off the Albert Hall and
gashed a great hole in its obese side! What a flood of light he would
let into that gloomy interior and what dignity he would impart to the
last remains of that bun-like edifice!
* * * * *
And now I find that I have come to the limit of the space allowed to me
for these notes, and I look through the list of over a hundred fine
names--splendid names because they belong to men who have done splendid
things--and I realize that I have not written a word about the larger
number of them and also that if I wrote from now until my personal
doomsday I could not express the admiration I feel for the sum of their
achievement. I have written notes only on a few of those who make an
immense appeal to me; it has been a purely personal choice and, as a
fact, quite unconscious; and as that, too, very incomplete, for it was
my optimistic conviction that I should return and write about the
others--scores of them; but now the chance is gone, in a few hours from
now these notes will have been flung to the printer’s devil (a person I
have always wanted to meet--but now had better not!) I want to rush back
and explain my personal beliefs about Botticelli and his influence on
the pre-British-Raphaelites, before the chance is gone, probably for
ever; I want to air certain convictions about the principles of rhythm
in Raphael’s curving lines; I want to write of Pinturicchio and Claude;
of Fragonard and Blake; I want to write about a dozen Frenchmen who are
not in the book and more about the four or five who are; I want to argue
with an imaginary reader as to whether Mr. Dulac is greater as a
caricaturist or as a decorator; I want to abuse nearly everybody for not
fully understanding that Mr. Vernon Hill is one of our finest
draughtsmen; I want to pen a humble appreciation of Mr. Tonks and his
salutary influence as a professor and his benign influence as an artist.
I want--I have just time for that--to again remind the reader--who has
my gratitude for still being with me to the end--that a drawing is a
thing to be looked at and not written about.
GEORGE SHERINGHAM.
[Illustration: “A COURIER.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY ALBRECHT DÜRER IN
THE BRITISH MUSEUM. SIZE, 7⅞ × 7⅜ IN.]
[Illustration: “THE RHINOCEROS.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY ALBRECHT
DÜRER IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM. SIZE, 10¾ × 16½ IN.]
[Illustration: “THE PROCESSION TO CALVARY.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY
ALBRECHT DÜRER IN THE UFFIZI, FLORENCE. SIZE, 8¼ × 11¼ IN.]
[Illustration: “PRAYING HANDS.” DRAWING IN INDIAN INK ON BLUE GROUND BY
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[Illustration: PHOTO. COPYRIGHT BY BRAUN AND CO.
SKETCH IN PEN AND INK BY HANS HOLBEIN IN THE BASLE MUSEUM FOR THE
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[Illustration: “YOUNG WOMAN WITH BASKET.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY
BERNARDINO PINTURICCHIO IN THE UFFIZI, FLORENCE.]
[Illustration: “THE DEAD CHRIST CARRIED OFF BY ANGELS.” DRAWING IN PEN
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[Illustration: STUDIES IN PEN AND INK BY LEONARDO DA VINCI.]
[Illustration: PHOTO. COPYRIGHT BY BRAUN AND CO.
“HEAD OF AN OLD MAN.” PENCIL DRAWING BY LEONARDO DA VINCI IN THE LOUVRE,
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[Illustration: “MADONNA AND CHILD.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY LEONARDO
DA VINCI IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM. SIZE, 5¼ × 3¾ IN.]
[Illustration: “HEAD OF A YOUNG WOMAN.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY
LEONARDO DA VINCI IN THE WINDSOR CASTLE COLLECTION.]
[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY BALDASSARE PERUZZI IN THE
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[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY TITIAN IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM.
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[Illustration: PHOTO. COPYRIGHT BY BRAUN AND CO.
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[Illustration: “THE TURK.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY GENTILE BELLINI IN
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[Illustration: “THE TURKISH LADY.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY GENTILE
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[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY MICHELANGELO BUONARROTI IN THE
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[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY MICHELANGELO BUONARROTI IN THE
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[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY MICHELANGELO BUONARROTI IN THE
BRITISH MUSEUM. SIZE, 12½ × 10 IN.]
[Illustration: SHEET OF STUDIES IN PENCIL AND PEN AND INK BY
MICHELANGELO BUONARROTI IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM. SIZE, 12⅛ × 10¾ IN.]
[Illustration: “ABUNDANCE.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK & pencil BY SANDRO
BOTTICELLI IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM. SIZE, 12½ × 10 IN.]
[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY RAPHAEL IN THE ACADEMY,
VENICE]
[Illustration: “LA VIERGE.” STUDY IN PEN AND INK BY RAPHAEL FOR “LA
BELLE JARDINIÈRE” IN THE LOUVRE, PARIS. SIZE, 11¾ × 8 IN.]
[Illustration: STUDY IN PEN AND INK BY RAPHAEL IN THE LOUVRE, PARIS FOR
“THE LAMENTATION FOR CHRIST.” SIZE, 11⅞ × 15 IN.]
[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY RAPHAEL IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM.
SIZE, 9¾ × 6½ IN.]
[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY RAPHAEL (SCHOOL OF) IN THE
BRITISH MUSEUM. SIZE, 7¾ × 15¼ IN.]
[Illustration: SHEET OF STUDIES IN PEN AND SEPIA BY PAOLO VERONESE IN
THE POSSESSION OF A. P. OPPÉ, ESQ. SIZE, 12 × 7¾ IN.]
[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY GIOVANNI FRANCESCO BARBIERI (IL
GUERCINO) IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM. SIZE, 12 × 18⅛ IN.]
[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY FRANCESCO ALBANO IN THE BRITISH
MUSEUM. SIZE, 7½ × 10½ IN.]
[Illustration: STUDY IN PEN AND INK BY TINTORETTO FOR “THE MIRACLE OF
ST. MARK” IN THE UFFIZI, FLORENCE]
[Illustration: “PHILIP IV.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY VELASQUEZ IN THE
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[Illustration: “LOT AND HIS FAMILY LEAVING SODOM.” DRAWING IN PEN AND
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[Illustration: “SASKIA.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY REMBRANDT IN THE
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[Illustration: “OLD COTTAGES.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY REMBRANDT IN
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PHOTO. COPYRIGHT BY BRAUN AND CO.]
[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY REMBRANDT IN THE BRITISH
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[Illustration: “JUDAS RESTORING THE PRICE OF HIS BETRAYAL.” DRAWING IN
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[Illustration: PORTRAIT STUDY IN PENCIL BY CORNELIS VISSCHER IN THE
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[Illustration: “TAVERN SCENE.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY ADRIAEN VAN
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[Illustration: “LE PASSAGE DU BAC.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY ADRIAEN
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[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY NICOLAS POUSSIN IN THE BRITISH
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[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY CLAUDE LORRAIN IN THE BRITISH
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[Illustration: DRAWING IN PENCIL AND COLOURED CHALKS (ARTIST UNKNOWN) IN
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[Illustration: “FAUN AND NYMPH.” DRAWING IN PEN AND SEPIA BY G. B.
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[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY PARMIGIANINO IN THE UFFIZI,
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[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY CANALETTO]
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[Illustration: “A HUNTING PARTY.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK & pencil BY
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[Illustration: “CUPIDS PLAYING AROUND A FALLEN HERMES.” DRAWING IN PEN
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[Illustration: SIZE, 4¼ × 3¾ IN.
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[Illustration: “THE HARVEST WAGON.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY THOMAS
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[Illustration: “SALISBURY.” PENCIL DRAWING BY JOHN CONSTABLE R.A., IN
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[Illustration: “MONOW BRIDGE, MONMOUTH.” PENCIL DRAWING BY J. M. W.
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[Illustration: PHOTO. COPYRIGHT BY BRAUN AND CO.
“PAGANINI.” PENCIL DRAWING BY J. A. D. INGRES IN THE BONNAT COLLECTION]
[Illustration: “C. R. COCKERELL.” PENCIL DRAWING BY J. A. D. INGRES IN
THE POSSESSION OF LT.-COL. PEPYS COCKERELL. SIZE, 8 × 6 IN.]
[Illustration: “EN TROISIÈME.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK AND WASH BY HONORÉ
DAUMIER IN THE POSSESSION OF G. BELLINGHAM SMITH, ESQ. SIZE, 8⅜ × 12⅛
IN.]
[Illustration: “LES TROIS CONNAISSEURS.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK AND WASH
BY HONORÉ DAUMIER IN THE BARBIZON HOUSE COLLECTION, LONDON. SIZE, 4¼ ×
4¾ IN.]
[Illustration: PENCIL DRAWING BY CHARLES MERYON IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM.
SIZE, 9½ × 5 IN.]
[Illustration: PENCIL STUDY FOR “AMORET BOUND IN THE HOUSE OF BUSIRANE”
(“FAERIE QUEENE”) BY ALFRED STEVENS IN THE TATE GALLERY. SIZE, 12 × 9½
IN.]
[Illustration: “THE MAIL COACH.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK AND WASH BY SIR
DAVID WILKIE, R.A., IN THE POSSESSION OF G. BELLINGHAM SMITH, ESQ. SIZE,
9 × 11½ IN.]
[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY CHARLES KEENE IN THE POSSESSION
OF CHARLES EMANUEL, ESQ. SIZE, 8 × 4¾ IN.]
[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY CHARLES KEENE IN THE POSSESSION
OF HAROLD HARTLEY, ESQ. SIZE, 6⅛ × 4½ IN.]
[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY CHARLES KEENE IN THE POSSESSION
OF CHARLES EMANUEL, ESQ. SIZE, 5 × 2⅞ IN.]
[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY CHARLES KEENE IN THE POSSESSION
OF CHARLES EMANUEL, ESQ. SIZE, 4¼ × 5 IN.]
[Illustration: ILLUSTRATION IN PEN AND INK BY JAMES MAHONEY TO “LITTLE
DORRIT” IN THE POSSESSION OF HAROLD HARTLEY, ESQ. SIZE, 3⅝ × 5¼ IN.]
[Illustration: ILLUSTRATION IN PEN AND INK BY A. BOYD HOUGHTON FOR
“DALZIEL’S BIBLE” (UNPUBLISHED) IN THE POSSESSION OF HAROLD HARTLEY,
ESQ. SIZE, 12⅞ × 7⅞ IN.]
[Illustration: “A DARK DEED.” PENCIL DRAWING BY FRED WALKER, A.R.A. IN
THE POSSESSION OF HAROLD HARTLEY, ESQ. SIZE, 6 × 6¾ IN.]
[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY GEORGE DU MAURIER IN THE
POSSESSION OF C. C. HOYER-MILLAR, ESQ. SIZE, 5⅞ × 9 IN.]
[Illustration: “THE OLD COUPLE AND THE CLOCK.” PENCIL DRAWING BY G. J.
PINWELL IN THE POSSESSION OF HAROLD HARTLEY, ESQ. SIZE, 7 × 5⅜ IN.]
[Illustration: UNPUBLISHED DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY KATE GREENAWAY IN
THE POSSESSION OF HAROLD HARTLEY, ESQ. SIZE, 7 × 5⅜ IN.]
[Illustration: “THE SOUL HOVERING OVER THE BODY RELUCTANTLY PARTING WITH
LIFE.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK AND SEPIA WASH BY WILLIAM BLAKE IN THE
POSSESSION OF EDWARD J. SHAW, ESQ., J.P. SIZE, 6⅝ × 9 IN. ONE OF THE
TWELVE DRAWINGS TO ILLUSTRATE THE EDITION OF “BLAIR’S GRAVE,” PUBLISHED
IN 1808.]
[Illustration: “JOHN BULL.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY AUBREY BEARDSLEY
IN THE POSSESSION OF EDWARD J. SHAW. ESQ., J.P. SIZE, 8½ × 6¾ IN.]
[Illustration: ILLUSTRATION IN PEN AND INK BY AUBREY BEARDSLEY TO “MORTE
D’ARTHUR” IN THE POSSESSION OF HAROLD HARTLEY, ESQ. SIZE, 11¼ × 8¾ IN.
REPRODUCED BY PERMISSION OF THE PUBLISHERS, MESSRS. J. M. DENT AND
SONS.]
[Illustration: “A PORTRAIT OF HER GRANDMOTHER.” UNPUBLISHED DRAWING IN
PEN AND INK BY PHIL MAY IN THE POSSESSION OF HAROLD HARTLEY, ESQ. SIZE,
9 × 7½ IN.]
[Illustration: DRAWING IN PENCIL AND CHALK BY PHIL MAY IN THE POSSESSION
OF HAROLD HARTLEY, ESQ. SIZE, 8½ × 6¾ IN.]
[Illustration: “PALM SUNDAY IN ITALY.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY
RICCARDO PELLEGRINI IN THE POSSESSION OF CHARLES EMANUEL, ESQ. “SIZE, 9½
× 12¾ IN.]
[Illustration: “SEVEN WORKS OF MERCY.” ONE OF A SET OF PENCIL DRAWINGS
BY SIR EDWARD BURNE-JONES, BART. IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM. SIZE, 14½ IN.
DIAMETER.]
[Illustration: PENCIL DRAWING BY DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI IN THE
POSSESSION OF G. BELLINGHAM SMITH, ESQ. SIZE, 7½ × 6 IN.]
[Illustration: “‘WHAT’S THIS?’ SAID THE LION”--ORIGINAL PENCIL DRAWING
BY SIR JOHN TENNIEL FOR “THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS,” IN THE POSSESSION
OF HAROLD HARTLEY. ESQ. SIZE, 2¾ × 3⅝ IN.]
[Illustration: “THREE LITTLE MEN.” PENCIL SKETCH BY SIR JOHN TENNIEL FOR
“MR. PUNCH’S POCKET BOOK,” IN THE POSSESSION OF HAROLD HARTLEY, ESQ.
SIZE, 2⅝ × 3⅞ IN.]
[Illustration: “GIRL WITH PARASOL.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY J. MᶜNEILL
WHISTLER IN THE POSSESSION OF MRS. G. R. HALKETT. SIZE, 6¼ × 3¾ IN.]
[Illustration: “THE BLACK-AND-WHITE KNIGHT” (SIR JOHN TENNIEL). DRAWING
IN PEN AND INK BY LINLEY SAMBOURNE (“PUNCH,” JUNE 24TH, 1893) IN THE
POSSESSION OF HAROLD HARTLEY, ESQ. SIZE, 7¼ × 5¾ IN. REPRODUCED BY
PERMISSION OF THE PROPRIETORS OF “PUNCH.”]
[Illustration: “THE RIALTO, VENICE.” PENCIL DRAWING BY WILLIAM CALLOW,
R.W.S., IN THE POSSESSION OF MESSRS. ERNEST BROWN & PHILLIPS (THE
LEICESTER GALLERIES). SIZE, 9⅜ × 14 IN.]
[Illustration: “PLACE DU PILLORI, PONT-AUDEMER.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK
BY BERNARD PARTRIDGE. SIZE, 5 × 7 IN.]
[Illustration: “WOMEN QUARRELLING.” PENCIL DRAWING BY W. RUSSELL FLINT,
R.W.S. SIZE, 13⅞ × 20⅞ IN.]
[Illustration: “THE CHILD.” PENCIL STUDY BY CLAUDE A. SHEPPERSON,
A.R.A., A.R.W.S., IN THE POSSESSION OF MESSRS. ERNEST BROWN AND PHILLIPS
(THE LEICESTER GALLERIES). SIZE, 12¼ × 8 IN.]
[Illustration: “FOLKESTONE.” PENCIL DRAWING BY ADRIAN HILL. SIZE, 8¼ ×
13 IN.]
[Illustration: PENCIL DRAWING BY FRANK L. EMANUEL. SIZE, 11 × 7¾ IN.]
[Illustration: “THE STEAM HAMMER.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK AND CHALK BY
FRANK BRANGWYN, R.A. SIZE, 16 × 12¼ IN.]
[Illustration: “AN OPEN SPACE.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY H. M. BATEMAN.
SIZE, 18½ × 12⅜ IN. REPRODUCED BY PERMISSION OF THE PROPRIETORS OF “THE
SKETCH.”]
[Illustration: DRAWING IN PENCIL AND WASH BY GEORGE BELCHER. SIZE, 10¼ ×
5¾ IN.]
[Illustration: PENCIL DRAWING BY A. HUGH FISHER, A.R.E. IN THE
POSSESSION OF CHARLES EMANUEL, ESQ. SIZE, 11⅛ × 4½ IN.]
[Illustration: PENCIL STUDY BY STEVEN SPURRIER. SIZE, 8 × 10 IN.]
[Illustration: “ROBESPIERRE’S LIST.” ILLUSTRATION IN PEN AND INK BY
EDMUND J. SULLIVAN, A.R.W.S. TO CARLYLE’S “FRENCH REVOLUTION.” SIZE, 8⅞
× 7⅛ IN. REPRODUCED BY PERMISSION OF THE PUBLISHERS, MESSRS. CHAPMAN AND
HALL.]
[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY L. LHERMITTE IN THE POSSESSION
OF CHARLES EMANUEL, ESQ. SIZE, 7¼ × 8 IN.]
[Illustration]
[Illustration: “THE SICK MOTHER.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY E. BLAMPIED,
R.E. SIZE, 13½ × 18½ IN.]
[Illustration: “MOTHER AND CHILD.” PENCIL DRAWING BY SIR WILLIAM ORPEN,
R.A., IN THE POSSESSION OF CAMPBELL DODGSON, ESQ., C.B.E. SIZE, 13 × 10
IN.]
[Illustration: “AFTER BATHING.” PENCIL DRAWING BY SIR WILLIAM ORPEN,
R.A. REPRODUCED BY PERMISSION OF THE CHENIL GALLERY. SIZE, 7½ × 11 IN.]
[Illustration: ILLUSTRATION IN PEN AND INK BY ARTHUR RACKHAM, R.W.S., TO
“RIP VAN WINKLE.” REPRODUCED BY PERMISSION OF THE PUBLISHER, MR. WILLIAM
HEINEMANN. SIZE, 9 × 8 IN.]
[Illustration]
[Illustration: ILLUSTRATION IN PEN AND INK BY HARRY CLARKE TO “THE RIME
OF THE ANCIENT MARINER” IN THE POSSESSION OF SIR ROBERT WOODS, M.P.
SIZE, 6½ × 10 IN.]
[Illustration: “GRASMERE CHURCH.” PENCIL STUDY BY EDMUND H. NEW FOR AN
ILLUSTRATION IN PEN AND INK TO “POEMS BY WORDSWORTH,” SELECTED BY DR.
STOPFORD A. BROOKE, PUBLISHED BY MESSRS. METHUEN AND CO. SIZE, 3 IN.
SQ.]
[Illustration: PENCIL DRAWING BY E. VERPILLEUX. SIZE, 3½ × 9 IN.]
[Illustration: “S. ANNE’S GATE, SALISBURY.” PENCIL DRAWING BY E. HESKETH
HUBBARD. SIZE, 8⅝ × 10⅛ IN.]
[Illustration: ILLUSTRATION IN PEN AND INK BY S. H. SIME TO LORD
DUNSANY’S “CHRONICLES OF RODRIQUEZ” (PUTNAM’S SONS). SIZE, 14 × 8¾
IN.]
[Illustration]
[Illustration: “NEAR CHESHAM, BUCKS.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY SYDNEY
R. JONES IN THE POSSESSION OF ROLAND P. STONE, ESQ. SIZE, 6 × 13 IN.]
[Illustration: “A SLEEPER.” PENCIL DRAWING BY VERNON HILL. SIZE, 12 × 8¾
IN.]
[Illustration: PENCIL STUDY BY WALTER W. RUSSELL, A.R.A. SIZE, 10⅜ × 8⅜
IN.]
[Illustration: “FRONT OF THE QUIRINAL PALACE, ROME.” PENCIL DRAWING BY
MUIRHEAD BONE. EXHIBITED AT THE GROSVENOR GALLERIES, LONDON.]
[Illustration: “QUAI DU CANAL, MARSEILLES.” DRAWING IN PENCIL AND WASH
BY MUIRHEAD BONE. EXHIBITED AT THE GROSVENOR GALLERIES, LONDON.]
[Illustration: “LIFE MIGHT LAST! WE CAN BUT TRY.” ILLUSTRATION IN PEN
AND INK BY HENRY OSPOVAT TO BROWNING’S “TOCCATA OF GALUPPI’S” IN THE
BRITISH MUSEUM. SIZE, 11¼ × 8¾ IN.]
[Illustration: ILLUSTRATION IN PEN AND INK BY R. ANNING BELL, R.A.,
R.W.S. TO “SHELLEY.” SIZE, 6 × 3¾ IN. REPRODUCED BY PERMISSION OF THE
PUBLISHERS, MESSRS. G. BELL AND SONS.]
[Illustration: “SACRILEGE.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY F. L. GRIGGS.
SIZE, 7¼ × 5⅞ IN.]
[Illustration: “THE HUNTSMAN”
SIZE, 6 IN. SQUARE
DRAWINGS IN PEN AND INK BY JOSEPH CRAWHALL IN THE POSSESSION OF WILLIAM
BURRELL, ESQ.]
[Illustration: “AN ALGERIAN CABBY”
SIZE, 5⅜ × 9⅛ IN.
DRAWINGS IN PEN AND INK BY JOSEPH CRAWHALL IN THE POSSESSION OF WILLIAM
BURRELL, ESQ.]
[Illustration]
[Illustration: “THE STRANDED BARGE.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY JAMES
McBEY. SIZE, 6⅝ × 12½ IN.]
[Illustration: PENCIL STUDY BY GLYN W. PHILPOT, A.R.A. SIZE, 5 × 4¼
IN.]
[Illustration]
[Illustration: “DELFT.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY MAXIME LALANNE IN THE
POSSESSION OF CHARLES EMANUEL, ESQ. SIZE, 10 × 8½ IN.]
[Illustration: “LES BÛCHERONS.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY T. A.
STEINLEN. SIZE, 10 × 7 IN.]
[Illustration: “LAVEUSES.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY T. A. STEINLEN.
SIZE, 10¾ × 8¾ IN.]
[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY J. L. FORAIN IN THE POSSESSION
OF MONSIEUR SIMONSON. SIZE, 9¾ × 6¾ IN.]
[Illustration: DRAWING IN PENCIL AND COLOURED CHALKS BY C. JOUAS. SIZE,
11 × 7 IN.]
[Illustration: “LE VIEUX MENTON.” PEN DRAWING BY A. LEPÈRE IN THE
POSSESSION OF MONSIEUR ED. SAGOT, PARIS. SIZE, 8¼ × 6 IN.]
[Illustration: “CRÈVECŒUR.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY A. LEPÈRE IN THE
POSSESSION OF MONSIEUR ED. SAGOT. SIZE, 5½ × 8⅝ IN.]
[Illustration: “LE QUAI DE PARIS À ROUEN.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK AND
WASH BY EUGÈNE BÉJOT. SIZE, 10½ × 7½ IN.]
[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY A. ROUBILLE. SIZE, 14⅞ × 8⅛
IN.]
[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY F. POULBOT. SIZE, 8 × 5 IN.]
[Illustration: “VENUS ET L’AMOUR.” DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY BERNARD
BOUTET DE MONVEL. SIZE, 5½ × 3½ IN.]
[Illustration: STUDY IN PEN AND INK BY BERNARD BOUTET DE MONVEL FOR “LA
GAZETTE DU BON TON.” SIZE, 7¼ × 6 IN.]
[Illustration: DRAWING IN PEN AND INK BY E. CARLÈGLE FOR “VIE
PARISIENNE.” SIZE, 7 × 3⅛ IN.]
*** End of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "Drawings in pen & pencil from Dürer's day to ours
- with notes and appreciations" ***
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