Description

176. Helena E. Wright, “Print Collecting in the Gilded Age,” Vol. 29, no. 1 (Spring 2004), 2-13.

Wright recounts that through much of the nineteenth-century prints were generally acquired for decorative or educational uses. By the 1880s more individuals began to form collections of prints for their intrinsic interest. Among the early collectors Wright treats are George Perkins Marsh (1801-1882), whose collection illustrated the history of engraving through Old Master prints, Francis Calley Gray (1790-1856), and Senator Charles Sumner (1811-1874), who wrote The Best Portraits in Engraving (1872). Wright also describes the collections of artists John Sartain and Stephen J. Ferris, which served them as working libraries. Some of these collections were acquired by major institutions and are still intact. James Lawrence Claghorn (1817-1884) of Philadelphia acquired the largest collection of prints to date and shared it with the public in numerous exhibitions, some at industrial fairs, such as those in Cincinnati. Interest in etchings and in American prints grew, as documented in exhibitions organized by Sylvester Koehler. The new photomechanical processes were included in some of these exhibitions.

177. David G. Wright, “American Reproductive and Replica Etchings: Reflections on the Deluxe Auction Catalogues of the 1880s,” Vol. 29, no. 1 (Spring 2004), 14-35.

Wright distinguishes between reproductive etchings and replica etchings (when the artist makes an etching of his own work) and provides a brief overview of the development of such etchings in America and Europe. The body of the article discusses the eight American auctions of the 1880s that were illustrated with a total of 115 etchings. Consignors include: Charles H. Truax, J. C. Runkle, Thomas Moran, Mary Jane Morgan estate, Alexander T. Stewart estate, Henry T. Chapman, J. Alden Weir with John H. Twachtman, and James H. Stebbins. Of the 31 American artist-etchers whose works are inventoried and tabulated, several receive considerable discussion with illustrations: Stephen J. Ferris, Peter Moran, Camille Piton, Joseph F. Sabin, Jr., Thomas Moran, Mary Nimmo Moran, James David Smillie, Frederick Juengling, Sidney L. Smith, James S. King, Paul Nimmo Moran, Richard Creifelds, and Stephen Parrish. The significance of auctioneer Thomas E. Kirby to the development and refinement of the illustrated auction catalogues is addressed. Contemporary judgments of the etchings by critics including Sylvester R. Koehler, James Ripley Wellman Hitchcock, Montague Marks, and Charles de Kay are included.

178. W. Dale Horst and Rose Marie Horst, “Frederick Stuart Church, Master of Imagination,” Vol. 29, no. 1 (Spring 2004), 36-47.

With limited training and a few commissions for commercial illustrations, Frederick Stuart Church (1842-1924) developed into a prolific illustrator and artist in several media. Over his lifetime he produced hundreds of illustrations for newspapers, magazines, and books. His works, often including animals and birds, reflected a keen sense of humor, an uncommon imagination, and a gentle spirit. His illustrations were reproduced as wood engravings, photomechanical prints, chromolithographs, and etchings. Although he was among the more successful and prominent American illustrator/artists of the late nineteenth century, changing tastes at the turn of the twentieth century severely reduced appreciation and demand for his work