Recently in Prints, Drawings, Paintings Category

Sutton Nicholls (active early 18th century), Gates of London, no date [1731]. Engraving. GA 2005.01593

This eighteenth-century print describes the ten London gates, each within a black border with a compass and description beneath. They are Ald-Gate, Bishops-Gate, Moore-Gate, Cripple-Gate, Alders-Gate, New-Gate, Lud-Gate, Temple Bar, Kings-Gate, the King Street gate at Westminster.

The engraving was first published in a portfolio entitled London Described; or Perspective Views and Elevations of Noted Buildings by the London print and map seller John Bowles in 1731 (only one copy in OCLC). According to the British Museum, “most of the prints had been issued before, but this one is only mentioned in Bowles’ 1731 catalogue, not the 1728.”

Engravings of the individual gates were used in various editions of Stow’s The History and Survey of the Cities of London and Westminster, and elsewhere. For information on the restoration of Temple Gate, see http://www.thetemplebar.info/

Thomas Rowlandson (1757-1827) after a design by George Moutard Woodward (1760-1809), A Parody on Milton!, 1808. Etching. Graphic Arts Rowlandson Collection. Gift of Dickson Q. Brown, Class of 1895.

On she came—such as I saw her in my dream—
Grease was in all her steps—Geneva [gin] in her hand,
and every Gesture, reeling ripe for fun!!

This is a slight variation on lines from Paradise Lost (Book 8):
…When out of hope, behold her, not far off,
Such as I saw her in my dream, adorn’d
With what all Earth or Heaven could bestow
To make her amiable; on she came,
Led by her heavenly Maker, though unseen,
And guided by his voice; nor uninform’d
Of nuptial sanctity and marriage rites:
Grace was in all her steps, Heaven in her eye,
In every gesture dignity and love.

Photoshopped

Current condition

Sir Frederic William Burton (1816-1900), Portrait sketch of George Eliot, 1865. Chalk drawing. M.L. Parrish Collection of Victorian Novelists CO171, Gift of Morris Longstreth Parrish, Class of 1888.

National Portrait Gallery London

Educated in Dublin, the Irish painter Frederic Burton moved to London in 1858, where he joined the pre-Raphaelite circle around Dante Gabriele Rossetti. He was elected a fellow of the Society of Antiquaries and then in 1874, Burton became the third director of the National Gallery.

Around the time Burton settled in London, the British writer Mary Ann Evans (1818-1890) began publishing under the pseudonym of George Eliot. Her romantic novel Romola was released in Cornhill Magazine from 1862 to 1863, and with the proceeds she and her life partner George Henry Lewes moved to a house on Regent’s Park.

In 1864, Eliot wrote about seeing a painting by Burton, in which a mailed knight is kissing the arm of a woman “by an uncontrollable movement.” The work was Hellelil and Hildebrand, the Meeting on the Turret Stairs (1864), now in the National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin. “[It] might have been made the most vulgar thing in the world,” she continued, “[but] the artist has raised it to the highest pitch of refined emotion.” The following year, she arranged to have Burton make her portrait, which is now hanging in the National Portrait Gallery. Princeton holds a preliminary sketch.

William Blake (1757-1827), The Landing of Julius Caesar, [1793] and The Landing of Brutus, [1793]. Watercolors finished in ink. Provenance: Colonel Gould Weston. Robert H. Taylor Collection (RHT), Rare Books and Special Collections. Gift of Robert H. Taylor, Class of 1930.

On October 10, 1793, William Blake issued a prospectus of upcoming work. He had completed America, A Prophecy and was about to publish Europe, A Prophecy. One title Blake described was The History of England, which was to be a small book of engravings, priced three shillings. No copies are known to exist. The twenty historical engravings would have included both “The Landing of Brutus” and “The Landing of Julius Caesar.” The Robert Taylor collection at Princeton University holds Blake’s watercolor studies for these two plates.

According to the Cambridge Companion to William Blake (Marquand PR4147 .C36 2003), “Most of Blake’s early drawings appear to come from incomplete or abortive projects, but one can observe the emergence of some of his mature themes. His series of watercolors of The History of England (Burlin 51-69) was begun at least as early as 1780, for in that year he exhibited The Death of Earl Goodwin (Burlin 60) at the Royal Academy. Though the series was never finished - he was evidently still thinking of engraving some of the designs as late as 1793 - some themes can be discerned.

The British Museum holds a copy of the watercolor The Death of Earl Goodwin.

Richard Westall (1765-1836), Fingal and Conbancarglas (also called Fingal meets Conban-Carglas), no date. Watercolor on paper. Robert H. Taylor Collection (RHT), Rare Books and Special Collections. Gift of Robert H. Taylor, Class of 1930.

Collector Robert Taylor not only acquired a first edition of the Gaelic poem cycle Fingal, published by James Macpherson in 1762 but also purchased a large watercolor by the British artist Richard Westall depicting one scene from this epic.

To put Westall in an art historical context, Thomas Rowlandson entered the Royal Academy at the Old Somerset house in 1772, William Blake followed in 1779, and Westall enrolled in 1785. He painted works for John Boydell’s Shakespeare Gallery, which was established in 1786 and later, served as Queen Victoria’s drawing master.

Westall illustrated many works of literature and we hold dozens of books decorated with his plates including works by John Milton, William Shakespeare, and Walter Scott. This undated watercolor illustrates an episode from Ossian’s poem, in which Fingal meets Coban-Carglas, daughter of King Torcul-Torno.

See also: James Macpherson (1736-1796), Fingal, An Ancient Epic Poem, in Six Books: Together with Several Other Poems, Composed by Ossian the Son of Fingal. Translated from the Gaelic language, by James Macpherson … (London: T. Becket and P. A. De Hondt, 1762). Robert H. Taylor Collection (RHT) 18th-1010 Oversize

4.These are the chattels babes, mothers, and men, to be sold by the head, in the slave pen;— A part of the house that Jeff built.
5.This is the thing, by some call’d a man, Whose trade is to sell all the chattels he can, From yearlings to adults of life’s longest span; In and out of the house that Jeff built.
6.These are the shackles, for those who suppose their limbs are their own from fingers to toes; And are prone to believe say all that you can, that they shouldn’t be sold by that thing call’d a man; Whose trade is to sell all the chattels he can from yearlings to adults of life’s longest span, in and out of the house that Jeff built.
7.These buy the slaves, both male and female, and sell their own souls to a boss with a tail, who owns the small soul of that thing call’d a man, whose trade is to sell all the chattels he can, from yearlings to adults of life’s longest span, in and out of the house that Jeff built.
8.Here the slave breeder parts with his own flesh to a trader down south, in the heart of secesh, thus trader and breeder secure without fail, the lasting attachment of him with a tail, who owns the small soul of that thing call’d a man, whose trade is to sell all the chattels he can, from yearlings to adult’s of life’s longest span, in and out of the house that Jeff built.
9.This is the scourge by some call’d the cat, Stout in the handle, and nine tails to that, t’is joyous to think that the time’s drawing near when the cat will no longer cause chattels to fear, nor the going, going, gone of that thing call’d a man, whose trade is to sell all the chattels he can, from yearlings to adults of life’s longest span, in and out of the house that Jeff built.
10.Here the slave driver in transport applies, nine tails to his victim, nor heeds her shrill cries, Alas! that a driver with nine tails his own, should be slave to a driver who owns only one, albeit he owns that thing call’d a man, whose trade is to sell all the chattels he can, from yearlings to adults of life’s longest span, in and out of the house that Jeff built.
11.Here’s the arch rebel Jeff whose infamous course, has bro’t rest to the plow and made active the hearse, and invoked on his head every patriots curse, spread ruin and famine to stock the slave pen, and furnish employment to that thing among men, whose trade is to sell all the chattels he can, from yearlings to adults of life’s longest span, in and out of the house that Jeff built.
12.But Jeff’s infamous house is doom’d to come down, so says Uncle Sam and so said John Brown. — With slave pen and auction shackles, driver and cat, together with buyer and seller and breeder and that, most loathsome of bipeds by some call’d a man, whose trade is to sell all the chattels he can, from yearlings to adults of life’s longest span, in and out of the house that Jeff built.

Joanna Southcott (or Southcote) (1750-1814), wrote prophecies “at the command of the spirit of God.” From 1792 to her death, Southcott attracted many followers as well as skeptics. Her most important prophecy came in 1813 when she announced that she would give birth to a messiah, called The Shiloh. Southcott was sixty-four years old but spent the last year of her life expecting a child by “the power of the Most High,” who was to “rule the nations with a rod of iron.”

Throughout the year, caricatures and cartoons were published ridiculing her. Here are two examples from July and November 1814. A baby was supposedly born in December and Southcott died soon after.

Rare Books and Special Collections holds over 100 books and pamphlets concerning Southcott. A favorite: Joanna Southcott (1750-1814), Prophecies Announcing the Birth of the Prince of Peace: Extracted from the Works of Joanna Southcott (London: W. Marchant, printer, Ingram-Court, [1814]). (Ex) BF1815.S7 S68 v. 5

John Martin (1789-1854), An Extensive Coastal Landscape Scene, 1847. Watercolor heightened with gouache. Gift of Robert Taylor.

Detail of signature in the lower left

The collection includes two works by the British artist John Martin, who was fifty-eight when he completed the watercolor shown here. At this time in his life, Martin split his focus between art and ecology. He founded the Metropolitan Sewage Manure Company in 1845 to manage the human waste flowing into the Thames and redirect it to agricultural use. Martin completed a number of small watercolors during this period rather than the mammoth oil paintings for which he was (and is) best known.

The collector Robert Taylor loved the British writers of the 19th century. It is somewhat surprising then to find an artist in his collection who was disliked by so many contemporary writers. William Thackeray called Martin’s work “huge, queer and tawdry to our eyes, but very much admired by the public.” The poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge wrote that Martin was “a poor creature” and exchanged nasty remarks about him in letters to Wordsworth. John Ruskin described Martin’s work as “mere manufacture, as much makeable to order as a tea-tray or a coal-scuttle.”

Thomas Rowlandson (1757-1827), A Peep into Friar Bacon’s Study, 1784. Etching. Graphic Arts Rowlandson Collection. Gift of Dickson Q. Brown, Class of 1895.

Roger Bacon (1214?-1294) The Opus majus of Roger Bacon. Translated by Robert Belle Burke (Bristol England; Sterling, Va.: Thoemmes Press, 2000). Firestone Library (F) B765.B23 O2 2000

Photoxylographic block

Timothy Cole (1852-1931) after a painting by John Singer Sargent (1856-1925), Portrait of Woodrow Wilson, Princeton University Class of 1879 (1856-1924), print 1919, printing block 1918. Wood engraving and block. GC030 Timothy Cole Prints Collection.

In his Conversations on Engraving, Timothy Cole wrote, “Deeper and more vital questions now confronted the engraver than ever perplexed the masters of earlier schools. A certain orchestration of color was demanded…all involving a more subtle sense of tonal gradations and a completer apprehension of values than was ever displayed by the old school.” (GAX NE 1000.C67)

Cole’s answer to this was to develop an expertise in photoxylography (a description of which was posted earlier). Basically this meant developing the photographic negative on the block and carving through it.

Princeton is fortunate to not only own Cole’s wood engraved prints but also his blocks. Above is an example of a photoxylographic block.

You will notice that the print is larger than the printing block. Because the image began with a photographic negative, which could be made in any size, several printing plates could be prepared in different sizes. This block is made for a cabinet card and the print is larger so it would be suitable for framing.

From the Middle Ages through the Renaissance, coronations, marriages, and other royal occasions were celebrated with a triumphal entry or parade into the city. According to Les fêtes de la Renaissance (Firestone GT3930 .J16), Charles V (1500-1558) held no less than five triumphal entries in 1529, 1533, 1536, 1542, and 1548 during the Habsburg consolidation.

In a 1525 entry in his diary, Albrecht Dürer (1471-1528) commented on one of Charles V’s entry marches and (rough translation) how the king was received with a costly triumph, how there was music and great rejoicing, and beautiful young maidens, whose like I have never seen. 350 years later, Austrian artist Hans Makart not only painted the maidens accompanying Charles V “clothed in little more than pearls,” but also included Dürer in the crowd.

Makart’s architectural fantasies are often compared with the operas of Richard Wagner, because of the artists’ shared belief in a Gesamtkunstwerk or total work of art. Makart’s painting was reproduced in various printed forms throughout Europe and the United States. The naked women led to censorship of the image through the Comstock Act and assured its widespread popularity in America.

Adolphe Lalauze (1838-1905) after a painting by Hans Makart (1840-1884), Entrée de Charles-Quint à Anvers (Entry of Charles V into Antwerp), ca. 1878. Etching with aquatint. French Print collection GC077.

Mount Vesuvius, a volcano in the gulf of Naples, is best known for erupting in the year 79 and destroying the cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum. According to T.A. Schneer’s The History of Vesuvius from A.D. 79 to A.D. 1907, there have also been major eruptions in 1794, 1822, 1834, 1850 and 1872. Almost a dozen of these explosions were depicted by Gianni for the local tourist market.

Fondazzjoni Patrimonju Malti (Maltese Heritage Foundation) identified this Neapolitan artist as Girolamo Gianni and mounted an exhibition of his paintings in 1994, providing the following biography:

Neapolitan artist Girolamo Gianni (1837-1895) first came to Malta in 1867, apparently to evaluate the local market. Evidently his stay was successful, as a year later he returned with his family. During the two decades of his Maltese sojourn, Gianni built up a profitable business running a busy bodega, producing small souvenir paintings and large commissioned works. His works feature topographically accurate landscapes, street scenes, and seascapes, and provide a romantic and idyllic record of daily life in Malta.

Belief is harmful, more harmful than wine

The power of the engines which overcomes the power of the church

By and by the bishops ate

Holy preachers who are kicked? with proletarian plasters?

Man does not need a heavenly reward

The voice of god is destined for the rich

Lava is coming with unscrupulous lies

Notes from the Library of Congress on the anti-religion campaigns in the Soviet Union.
“The Soviet Union was the first state to have as an ideological objective the elimination of religion. Toward that end, the Communist regime confiscated church property, ridiculed religion, harassed believers, and propagated atheism in the schools. Actions toward particular religions, however, were determined by State interests, and most organized religions were never outlawed. The main target of the anti-religious campaign in the 1920s and 1930s was the Russian Orthodox Church, which had the largest number of faithful. Nearly all of its clergy, and many of its believers, were shot or sent to labor camps. Theological schools were closed, and church publications were prohibited. By 1939 only about 500 of over 50,000 churches remained open.”

See also: http://www.soviethistory.org/index.php?page=subject&SubjectID=1924antireligion&Year=1924

Graphic Arts ephemera, GC149

C.W.E. Dietrich, also known as Dietricy, was appointed court painter to Frederick-Augustus II and later, inspector of the Gemäldegalerie in Dresden. Near the end of his life, he accepted the position of professor of landscape painting at the Akademie der Bildenden Künste.

The Irish collector William Horatio Crawford (1812-1888) brought this set of Dietrich etchings together, most in their first state. A generous patron of the arts, Crawford lived in Ballinure, outside Cork on the Mahon peninsula, where he built a significant botanical garden and library.

Unknown artist after Jan van de Velde II (ca. 1593-1641) after Pieter Jansz Saenredam (1597-1665), Boekdruckereye te Haerlem gevonden ontrent het Jaer 1440, no date [original 1628]. Collotype of etching. Graphic Arts GA2011- in process

Graphic Arts holds a collotype of Jan van de Velde’s etching after Saenredam’s illustration of a fifteenth-century print shop. This is one of seventeen prints, most drawn by Saenredam, for the 3rd edition of Samuel Ampzing’s Beschryvinge ende lof der stad Haerlem… (Description and Praise of the City of Haarlem) (1628).

Three men are depicted including a compositor working in the back at the type cases, a printer in the foreground comparing two proof sheets, and barely visible behind him, another pressman operating the press.

British Museum

The Political “Siamese” Twins: The Offspring of Chicago Miscegenation, 1864. Lithograph. Published New York: Currier & Ives. Graphic Arts GA 2011- in process.

The firm of Currier & Ives produced this caricature around the Chicago Democratic National Convention in 1864. The oddly-paired democratic ticket included George B. McClellan (1826-1885) and “Gentleman” George Hunt Pendelton (1825-1889), shown here as Siamese twins. They are held together by “the party tie.” McClellan says, “It was not I that did it fellow Soldiers!! but with this unfortunate attachment I was politically born at Chicago!” Pendleton says, “I dont care how many letters Mac writes, if it brings him votes; for every vote for him, count one for me!!”

John Leech (1817-1864), Fishing is the Best Sport for a Retired Schoolmaster - As He Can Still Exhibit his Partiality for the Rod, 1850. Watercolor on paper. Graphic Arts GA 2006.02346.

John Leech (1817-1864), Contemplating a Day’s Fishing, Mr. Briggs Gets His Tackle in Order, and Trys the Management of His Running Line, ca. 1860. Watercolor on board. Design for plate one in Mr. Briggs & His Doings. Fishing (London: Bradbury & Evans [1860]). Graphic Arts GA 2006.02345

For the book, see:Mr. Briggs & His Doings. Fishing. Rare Books: Otto von Kienbusch Angling Collection (ExKi) Oversize 2003-0004F

George Cruikshank (1792-1878), "The Antiquarian Society" in Scourge, or, Monthly Expositor of Imposture and Folly (June 1812): 431. Graphic Arts GA Cruik 1811.2.

One of George Cruikshank's early jobs was creating the frontispiece caricatures for William N. Jones's satirical journal The Scourge; first subtitled: Monthly Expositor of Imposture and Folly and then, Literary, Theatrical, and Miscellaneous Magazine, and finally, Monthly Expositor of Literary, Dramatic, Medical, Political, Mercantile and Religious Imposture and Folly (1811-1816).

These large hand-colored foldouts were often attacks on the royal family and leading politicians, although this 1812 satire looks at book collectors. An accompanying article notes that antiquarians "collect materials without any regard to their utility, and without attempting to facilitate the study of antiquities, by arranging them in classes, and by pointing out their dependence on each other, or their connection with collateral branches of investigation." It goes on.

Brandeis wrote a nice piece about Scourge in their blog: http://brandeisdigitallibrary.blogspot.com/2011/03/scourge-or-monthly-expositor-of.html

Valentine Green (1739-1813) after a design by Frederick George Byron (1764-1792), A Representation of Mr. Lunardi’s Balloon, as Exhibited in the Pantheon, 1784. Aquatint. GC014 Aeronautical Illustrations Collection.

The Balloon Stone (Lunardi Monument) at Standon Green End reads: “Let posterity know, and knowing be astonished, that on the 15th day of September 1784 Vincent Lunardi of Lucca in Tuscany, the first aerial traveller in Britain, mounting from the artillery ground in London and traversing the regions of the air for two hours and fifteen minutes, in this spot revisited the earth.” Lunardi flew twenty-four miles with a dog, a cat, and a pigeon. The cat got airsick. His balloon was then exhibited in the Pantheon.

This print is one of 400 in the Aeronautical illustration collection, collected by Harold Fowler McCormick and given to Princeton University by Alexander Stillman of Chicago, a relative of the McCormick family. Here are a few others.

Grand Jubilee in Honour of Peace, 1814. Published by John Pitts (1765-1844), Engraving with printed color. GC014 Aeronautical Illustrations Collection. This Jubilee on Augt. 1, 1814 was to Celebrate the return of Peace and the centenary of the reign of the illustrious House of Brunswick and to commemorate the glorious battle of the nile.

Thomas Shotter Boys (1803-1874), Piccadilly Looking Towards the City published in London As It Is, 1842. Lithograph. GC014 Aeronautical Illustrations Collection

Paul Gauci (active 1834-1866), A View in the Neighbourhood of Sevenoaks Selected by Mr. T. R. Jolliffe and Professor Cornillot for the Scene of Their First Aerial Ascent, no date (after 1825). Lithograph. GC014 Aeronautical Illustrations Collection

Thomas Rowlandson (1756 or 1757-1827), The Departure of the Balloon from Dover, 1794. Etching. GC014 Aeronautical Illustrations Collection

Samuel Johnson Woolf (1880-1948), Self-portrait, 1938. Charcoal and white chalk on paper. Graphic Arts collection 2006-02518

Brock’s only complaint was that Woolf’s most famous portrait, that of George Bernard Shaw, was not included. Days later, in a letter to the editor, Howard C. Rice, Jr. of Princeton’s Department of Rare Books & Special Collections reported that Mr. and Mrs. Bruce Colen of Holicong, PA had read the story and loaned the drawing, which they owned, to the University exhibition.

After the close of the exhibition, all the charcoal drawings were returned to Woolf’s widow. Now, over sixty years later, thanks to the generous gift of Sue Kessler Feld and Stuart P. Feld, Class of 1957, we again have a substantial collection of Woolf’s portraits. Here is a small selection.

Aristide Briand (1862-1932). Served eleven terms as Prime Minister of France. Drawing published on the front page of The New York Times, May 25, 1930.

Samuel John Gurney Hoare, 1st Viscount Templewood (1880-1959). British Foreign Minister; authored the Hoare-Laval Pact with French Prime Minister Pierre Laval. Published in Newsweek Aug. 31, 1935

Helen Rogers (Mrs. Ogden Mills) Reid, (1882-1970). President of The New York Herald Tribune; Herald Tribune Corporation; and Chairman of the Board. Published in Newsweek Nov. 23, 1935.

Edouard Herriot (1872-1957). French politician, served three times as Prime Minister and President of the Chamber of Deputies. Published in NY Herald Tribune, Feb. 17, 1929.

Hugh Gibson (1880-1948). American diplomat, active in Poland 1919-1924. Published in NYT Magazine, June 21, 1931.

Dr. Graeme M. Hammond (1858-1944). Neurologist and professor of nervous diseases at NYU Medical School. Published in NYT Magazine Mar. 13, 1938.

Margaret Grace Bondfield (1863-1935). English Labor politician, the first woman Cabinet Minister and one of the first three female Labor MPs. Published in NYT Magazine July 28, 1929.

Leonor Fresnel Loree (1858-1940). President of the Delaware & Hudson Railroad, among others. Chairmain of the Rutgers Board of Trustees Committee on New Jersey College for Women (now Douglass College). Published in Newsweek Sept. 14, 1935.

Evangeline Cory Booth (1865-1950). Founder of the British Salvation Army and later General of the United States Salvation Army. Raised over $12,000 for relief work after SF earthquake. Published in Newsweek Nov. 10, 1934.

Maude Royden (1876-1956). England’s most famous woman preacher and suffragist; first woman to receive a Doctor of Divinity. Published in Newsweek, Jan. 23, 1937.

J. Ramsay MacDonald (1866-1937). British politician who was the first Labor Prime Minister. Published in NY Herald Tribune Magazine, Sept. 1, 1929.