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GRAVEN
IMAGES
 As
the earliest writing took the form of pictographs
that powerful phrase “In the beginning
was the Word” could as appositely
be rendered as “In the beginning was the Image”.
The very word 'image' has a potency of concept
the more enhanced when in conjunction with the
word 'graven' with its biblical connotations,
lost in the more prosaic modern usage “printed
images”.
It
is a significant semantic curiosity that today
the word 'image' is almost always confined to
discussion of printed material. Paintings are
described in terms of imagery and particular “passages
of painting” are singled out for praise.
One would not encapsulate appreciation of the
actual painting of the ‘Mona Lisa’ in
the words a “stunning image” but
the phrase would adequately demonstrate the achievement
of not only the most famous of original prints
such as Dürer’s ‘Melancolia’,
Rembrandt’s ‘Christ presented to
the People’ or Picasso’s ‘Minotauromachie’ (and
indeed even a colour reproduction print of the ‘Mona
Lisa’) but is equally apt for many less
widely–known minor masterpieces of printmaking.
Certain
intrinsic qualities are specific only to the
printed image. The availability of multiple impressions
can re-enforce the significance of a particular
image, and through familiarity give it an icon-like
status. Certain surface textures, quality of
line and tonal nuances are only possible through
the appropriate technique of engraving, etching,
woodblock or lithography. The very action of
printing itself adds an extra dimension to printed
works of art. Just as one’s own slight
doodles gain stature if photocopied, the act
of printing which transfers the image from the
inked matrix to the paper, stamps an added significance
and enhances the immediacy of a graphic image
with a sense of permanence and monumentality.
 Though
the origin of the word 'graphic' lies in the
ancient Greek for “hand-drawn” it
has come to be associated with the artist drawing
not so much on paper but into the etching ground
or onto the lithographic stone or woodblock,
so that the ‘graphic arts’ have become
synonymous with printmaking. By extension, and
a compliment to generations of printmakers, graphic as a literary adjective denotes a vividly life-like
description of great immediacy and power.
This
catalogue offers a wide range of recent acquisitions,
mainly in the lower price bracket as a concession
to recessionary times. The prints are arranged
roughly in chronological and national sequences,
though this is abandoned when interesting comparisons
in subject matter or technique would otherwise
be separated. Artists’ works that are stylistically
related or have coincidences in their production
are also kept together where practicable. French,
Dutch, Germanic and American artists are grouped
nationally, while British prints are treated
in three more extensive groups – pre-1920,
1920-30, post 1930.
A
Muirhead Bone drypoint compared with its accompanying
preliminary drawing confirms the power of the
printed image, combining graphic immediacy with
a fully thought-out finished composition. The
front cover of the catalogue demonstrates how
a small etching can be successfully enlarged
way beyond its actual size (in this instance
by 300%) and thus is witness to the monumentality
inherent in the original engraved image.
Published
1992
44 pages, 137 items described, 138 illustrations
in b/w.
(UK
Price: £7, International orders: £10)
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Artists
included in the catalogue:
- Amman
J.
- Anderson
S.
- Ardizzone
E.
- Arms
J.T.
- Austin
R.S.
- Bastien-Lepage
J.
- Bauer
M.
- Beham
S.
- Béjot
E.
- Benson
F.W.
- Bone
M.
- Bone
S.
- Brangwyn
F.
- Büsinck
L.
- Callot
J.
- Cameron
D.Y.
- Carrière
E.
- Chamberlain
S.
- Copley
J.
- Cowern
R.T.
- Craig
E.G.
- Daniel
H.W.
- Daumier
H.
- Detmold
E.J.
- Dix
O.
- Dodd
F.
- Drury
P.
- Dupont
P.
- Dürer
A.
- Dyck
A. van
- Evershed
A.
- Figura
H.
- Gabain
E.
- Gaskell
P.
- Gethin
P.F.
- Gibbings
R.
- Gill
E.
- Griggs
F.L.M.
- Gross
A.
- Guthrie
J.J.
- Hartrick
A.S.
- Holmes
K.
- Kasimir
L.
- Keene
C.S.
- Klemm
W.
- Kobell
F.
- Lange
O.
- Lee-Hankey
W.
- Legrand
L.
- Legros
A.
- Leibl
W.
- Lieberman
M.
- Lindsay
L.
- Macleod
W.D.
- McNab
A.
- Marchand
J.
- Matham
J.
- Meidner
L.
- Monogrammist
MT
- Morgan
W.E.C.
- Osborne
M
- Palmer
S.
- Perelle
- Raffaëlli
J.F.
- Ravesteyn
J. van
- Read
D.
- Robins
W.P.
- Rodin
A.
- Rosenburg
L.C.
- Roussel
T.C.
- Rushbury
H.
- Schmutzer
F.
- Short
F.
- Skippe
J.
- Slevogt
M.
- Solis
V.
- Soutman
P.
- Spencer
N.W.
- Staeger
F.
- Strang
W.
- Struck
H.
- Sturges
D.C.
- Suyderhoef
J.
- Sweet
D.
- Tanner
R.
- Taylor
C.W.
- Tilleard
R.
- Todd
A.R.M.
- Treu
M.
- Vinckboons
D.
- Visscher
C.J.
- Vos
M. de
- Ward
L.
- Warlow
H.G.
- Webb
J.
- Wedgwood
G.H.
- White
E.
- Wierix
A.
- Wolff
H.
- Wolfsfeld
E.
- Wyllie
W.L.
- Zeising
W.
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