CHAPTER II.
ELEMENTARY ILLUSTRATION.
HE first object of an illustration, the practical part, is obviously, to illustrate and elucidate the text—a matter often lost sight of. The second is to be artistic, and includes works of the imagination, decoration, ornament, style. In this chapter we shall consider the first, the practical part.
Nearly twenty years ago, at a meeting of the Society of Arts in London, the general question was discussed, whether in the matter of illustrating books and newspapers we are really keeping pace with the times; whether those whose business it is to provide the illustrations which are tossed from steam presses at the rate of several thousand copies an hour, are doing the best work they can.
In illustrated newspapers, it was argued, “there should be a clearer distinction between fact and fiction, between news and pictures.” The exact words may be thought worth repeating now.[3]
“In the production of illustrations we have arrived at great proficiency, and from London are issued the best illustrated newspapers in the world. But our artistic skill has led us into temptation, and by degrees engendered a habit of making pictures when we ought to be recording facts. We have thus, through our cleverness, created a fashion and a demand from the public for something which is often elaborately untrue.
Would it, then, be too much to ask those who cater for (and really create) the public taste, that they should give us one of two things, or rather two things, in our illustrated papers, the real and the ideal—
1st. Pictorial records of events in the simplest and truest manner possible;
2nd. Pictures of the highest class that can be printed in a newspaper?
Here are two methods of illustration which only require to be kept distinct, each in its proper place, and our interest in them would be doubled. We ask first for a record of news and then for a picture gallery; and to know, to use a common phrase, which is which.”
At the time referred to, drawing on the wood-block and engraving were almost universal—instantaneous photography was in its infancy, “process blocks,” that is to say, mechanical engraving, was very seldom employed, and (for popular purposes) American engraving and printing was considered the best.
The system of producing illustrations in direct fac-simile of an artist’s drawing, suitable for printing at a type press without the aid of the wood engraver, is of such value for cheap and simple forms of illustration, and is, moreover, in such constant use, that it seems wonderful at first sight that it should not be better understood in England. But the cause is not far to seek. We have not yet acquired the art of pictorial expression in black and white, nor do many of our artists excel in “illustration” in the true sense of the word.
It has often been pointed out that through the pictorial system the mind receives impressions with the least effort and in the quickest way, and that the graphic method is the true way of imparting knowledge. Are we then, in the matter of giving information or in imparting knowledge through the medium of illustrations, adopting the truest and simplest methods? I venture to say that in the majority of cases we are doing nothing of the kind. We have pictures in abundance which delight the eye, which are artistically drawn and skilfully engraved, but in which, in nine cases out of ten, there is more thought given to effect as a picture than to illustrating the text.
It has often been suggested that the art of printing is, after all, but a questionable blessing on account of the error and the evil disseminated by it. Without going into that question, I think that we may find that the art of printing with movable type has led to some neglect of the art of expressing ourselves pictorially, and that the apparently inexorable necessity of running every word and thought into uniform lines, has cramped and limited our powers of expression, and of communicating ideas to each other.
Let us begin at the lowest step of the artistic ladder, and consider some forms of illustration which are within the reach of nearly every writer for the press. With the means now at command for reproducing any lines drawn or written, in perfect fac-simile, mounted on square blocks to range with the type, and giving little or no trouble to the printer, there is no question that we should more frequently see the hand work of the writer as well as of the artist appearing on the page. For example: it happens sometimes in a work of fiction, or in the record of some accident or event, that it is important to the clear understanding of the text, to know the exact position of a house, say at a street corner, and also (as in the case of a late trial for arson) which way the wind blew on a particular evening. Words are powerless to explain the position beyond the possibility of doubt or misconstruction; and yet words are, and have been, used for such purposes for hundreds of years, because it is “the custom.”
But if it were made plain that where words fail to express a meaning easily, a few lines, such as those above, drawn in ink on ordinary paper, may be substituted (and, if sent to the printer with the manuscript, will appear in fac-simile on the proof with the printed page), I think a new light may dawn on many minds, and new methods of expression come into vogue.
This illustration (which was written on the sheet of MS.) is one example, out of a hundred that might be given, where a diagram should come to the aid of the verbal description, now that the reproduction of lines for the press is no longer costly, and the blocks can be printed, if necessary, on rapidly revolving cylinders, which (by duplicating) can produce in a night 100,000 copies of a newspaper.
Before exploring some of the possibilities of illustration, it may be interesting to glance at what has been done in this direction since the invention of producing blocks rapidly to print at the type press and the improvements in machinery.
In the spring of 1873 a Canadian company started a daily illustrated evening newspaper in New York, called The Daily Graphic, which was to eclipse all previous publications by the rapidity and excellence of its illustrations. It started with an attempt to give a daily record of news, and its conductors made every effort to bring about a system of rapid sketching and drawing in line. But the public of New York in 1873 (as of London, apparently, in 1893) cared more for “pictures,” and so by degrees the paper degenerated into a picture-sheet, reproducing (without leave) engravings from the Illustrated London News, the Graphic, and other papers, as they arrived from England. The paper was lithographed, and survived until 1889.
The report of the first year’s working of the first daily illustrated newspaper in the world is worth recording. The proprietors stated that although the paper was started “in a year of great financial depression, they have abundant reason to be satisfied with their success,” and further, that they attribute it to “an absence of all sensational news.”(!)
The report ended with the following interesting paragraph:
“Pictorial records of crime, executions, scenes involving misery, and the more unwholesome phases of social life, are a positive detriment to a daily illustrated newspaper. In fact, the higher the tone and the better the taste appealed to, the larger we have found our circulation to be.”
The great art, it would seem, of conducting a daily illustrated newspaper is to know what to leave out—when, in fact, to have no illustrations at all!
In England the first systematic attempt at illustration in a daily newspaper was the insertion of a little map or weather chart in the Times in 1875, and the Pall Mall Gazette followed suit with a dial showing the direction of the wind, and afterwards with other explanatory diagrams and sketches.
But, in June, 1875, the Times and all other newspapers in England were far distanced by the New York Tribune in reporting the result of a shooting match in Dublin between an American Rifle Corps and some of our volunteers. On the morning after the contest there were long verbal reports in the English papers, describing the shooting and the results; but in the pages of the New York Tribune there appeared a series of targets with the shots of the successful competitors marked upon them, communicated by telegraph and printed in the paper in America on the following morning.[4]
After this period we seem to have moved slowly, only some very important geographical discovery, or event, extorting from the daily newspapers an explanatory plan or diagram. But during the “Transit of Venus,” on the 6th of December, 1882, a gleam of light was vouchsafed to the readers of the Daily Telegraph (and possibly to other papers), and that exciting astronomical event from which “mankind was to obtain a clearer knowledge of the scale of the universe,” was understood and remembered better, by three or four lines in the form of a diagram (showing, roughly, the track of Venus and its comparative size and distance from the sun) printed in the newspaper on the day of the event.
Maps and plans have appeared from time to time in all the daily newspapers, but not systematically, or their interest and usefulness would have been much greater. Many instances might be given of the use of diagrams in newspapers; a little dial showing the direction of the wind, is obviously better than words and figures, but it is only lately that printing difficulties have been overcome, and that the system can be widely extended.
It remains to be seen how far the Daily Graphic, with experience and capital at command, will aid in a system of illustration which is one day to become general. Thus far it would seem that the production of a large number of pictures (more or less à-propos) is the popular thing to do. We may be excused if we are disappointed in the result from a practical point of view; for as the functions of a daily newspaper are primâ facie to record facts, it follows that if words fail to communicate the right meaning, pictorial expression should come to the aid of the verbal, no matter how crude or inartistic the result might appear.
Let me give one or two examples, out of many which come to mind.
1. The transmission of form by telegraph. To realise the importance of this system in conveying news, we have only to consider (going back nearly forty years) what interest would have been added to Dr. Russell’s letters from the Crimea in the Times newspaper, if it had been considered possible, then, to have inserted, here and there, with the type, a line or two pictorially giving (e.g.) the outline of a hillside, and the position of troops upon it. It was possible to do this in 1855, but it is much more feasible now. The transmission of form by telegraph is of the utmost importance to journalists and scientific men, and, as our electricians have not yet determined the best methods, it may be interesting to point out the simplest and most rudimentary means at hand. The method is well known in the army and is used for field purposes, but hitherto newspapers have been strangely slow to avail themselves of it. The diagram on the opposite page will explain a system which is capable of much development with and without the aid of photography.
If the reader will imagine this series of squares to represent a portable piece of open trellis-work, which might be set up at a window or in the open field, between the spectator and any object of interest at a distance—each square representing a number corresponding with a code in universal use—it will be obvious, that by noticing the squares which the outline of a hill would cover, and telegraphing the numbers of the squares, something in the way of form and outline may be quickly communicated from the other side of the world.
CODE FOR TRANSMITTING FORM BY TELEGRAPH.
This is for rough-and-ready use in time of war, when rapidity of communication is of the first importance; but in time of peace a correspondent’s letter continually requires elucidation.
Next is an example, which, for want of better words, I will call “the shorthand of pictorial art.” A newspaper correspondent is in a boat on one of the Italian lakes, and wishes to describe the scene on a calm summer day. This is how he proceeds—
“We are shut in by mountains,” he says, “but the blue lake seems as wide as the sea. On a rocky promontory on the left hand the trees grow down to the water’s edge and the banks are precipitous, indicating the great depth of this part of the lake. The water is as smooth as glass; on its surface is one vessel, a heavily-laden market boat with drooping sails, floating slowly down” (and so on)—there is no need to repeat it all; but when half a column of word-painting had been written (and well-written) the correspondent failed to present the picture clearly to the eye without these four explanatory lines (no more) which should of course have been sent with his letter.
This method of description requires certain aptitude and training; but not much, not more than many a journalist could acquire for himself with a little practice. The director of the Daily Graphic is reported to have said that “the ideal correspondent, who can sketch as well as write, is not yet born.” He takes perhaps a higher view of the artistic functions of a daily newspaper than we should be disposed to grant him; by “we” I mean, of course, “the public,” expecting news in the most graphic manner. There are, and will be, many moments when we want information, simply and solely, and care little how, or in what shape, it comes.
This kind of information, given pictorially, has no pretension to be artistic, but it is “illustration” in the true sense of the word, and its value when rightly applied is great. When the alterations at Hyde Park Corner (one of the most important of the London improvements of our day) were first debated in Parliament, a daily newspaper, as if moved by some sudden flash of intelligence, printed a ground-plan of the proposed alterations with descriptive text; and once or twice only, during Stanley’s long absence in Africa, did we have sketches or plans printed with the letters to elucidate the text, such as a sketch of the floating islands with their weird inhabitants, at Stanley’s Station on the Congo river, which appeared in a daily newspaper—instances of news presented to the reader in a better form than words. “The very thing that was wanted!” was the general exclamation, as if there were some new discovery of the powers of description.
As the war correspondent’s occupation does not appear likely to cease in our time, it would seem worth while to make sure that he is fully equipped.
The method of writing employed by correspondents on the field of battle seems unnecessarily clumsy and prolix; we hear of letters written actually under fire, on a drum-head, or in the saddle, and on opening the packet as it arrives by the post we may find, if we take the trouble to measure it, that the point of the pen or pencil, has travelled over a distance of a hundred feet! This is the actual ascertained measurement, taking into account all the ups and downs, crosses and dashes, as it arrives from abroad. No wonder the typewriter is resorted to in journalism wherever possible.
A newspaper correspondent is sent suddenly to the seat of war, or is stationed in some remote country to give the readers of a newspaper the benefit of his observations. What is he doing in 1894? In the imperfect, clumsy language which he possesses in common with every minister of state and public schoolboy, he proceeds to describe what he sees in a hundred lines, when with two or three strokes of the pen he might have expressed his meaning better pictorially. I have used these words before, but they apply with redoubled force at the present time. The fact is, that with the means now at command for reproducing any lines drawn or written, the correspondent is not thoroughly equipped if he cannot send them as suggested, by telegraph or by letter. It is all a matter of education, and the newspaper reporter of the future will not be considered complete unless he is able to express himself, to some extent, pictorially as well as verbally. Then, and not till then, will our complicated language be rescued from many obscurities, by the aid of lines other than verbal.[5]
In nearly every city, town, or place there is some feature, architectural or natural, which gives character to it, and it would add greatly to the interest of letters from abroad if they were headed with a little outline sketch, or indication of the principal objects. This is seldom done, because the art of looking at things, and the power of putting them down simply in a few lines, has not been cultivated and is not given to many.
Two things are principally necessary to attain this end—
A STUDY IN PERSPECTIVE. (HUME NISBET.)
A. Standpoint. B. Point of Sight. C. Horizontal line. D. Vanishing lines.
E. Point of distance. F. Vanishing lines of distance. G. Line of sight.
1. The education of hand and eye and a knowledge of perspective, to be imparted to every schoolboy, no matter what his profession or occupation is likely to be.
2. The education of the public to read aright this new language (new to most people), the “shorthand of pictorial art.”
The popular theory amongst editors and publishers is that the public would not care for information presented to them in this way—that they “would not understand it and would not buy it.” Sketches of the kind indicated have never been fairly tried in England; but they are increasing in number every day, and the time is not far distant when we shall look back upon the present system with considerable amusement and on a book or a newspaper which is not illustrated as an incomplete production. The number of illustrations produced and consumed daily in the printing press is enormous; but they are too much of one pattern, and, as a rule, too elaborate.
In the illustration of books of all kinds there should be a more general use of diagrams and plans to elucidate the text. No new building of importance should be described anywhere without an indication of the elevation, if not also of the ground plan; and, as a rule, no picture should be described without a sketch to indicate the composition. In history words so often fail to give the correct locale that it seems wonderful we have no better method in common use. The following rough plan will illustrate one of the simplest ways of making a description clear to the reader. Take the verbal one first:—
“The young Bretonne stood under the doorway of the house, sheltered from the rain which came with the soft west wind. From her point of vantage on the ‘Place’ she commanded a view of the whole village, and could see down the four streets of which it was principally composed.”
In this instance a writer was at some pains to describe (and failed to describe in three pages) the exact position of the streets near where the girl stood; and it was a situation in which photography could hardly help him.
It may seem strange at first sight to occupy the pages of a book on art with diagrams and elementary outlines, but it must be remembered that plans and diagrams are at the basis of a system of illustration which will one day become general. The reason, as already pointed out, for drawing attention to the subject now, is that it is only lately that systems have been perfected for reproducing lines on the printed page almost as rapidly as setting up the type. Thus a new era, so to speak, in the art of expressing ourselves pictorially as well as verbally has commenced: the means of reproduction are to hand; the blocks can be made, if necessary, in less than three hours, and copies can be printed on revolving cylinders at the rate of 10,000 an hour.
The advance in scientific discovery by means of subtle instruments brings the surgeon sometimes to the knowledge of facts which, in the interests of science, he requires to demonstrate graphically, objects which it would often be impossible to have photographed. With a rudimentary knowledge of drawing and perspective, the surgeon and the astronomer would both be better equipped. At the University of Pennsylvania, in Philadelphia, where the majority of students are intended for the medical profession, this subject is considered of high importance, and the student in America is learning to express himself in a language that can be understood.
In architecture it is often necessary, in order to understand the description of a building, to indicate in a few lines not only the general plan and elevation, but also its position in perspective in a landscape or street. Few architects can do this if called upon at a moment’s notice in a Parliamentary committee room. And yet it is a necessary part of the language of an architect.[6]
These remarks apply with great force to books of travel, where an author should be able to take part in the drawing of his illustrations, at least to the extent of being able to explain his meaning and ensure topographical accuracy.
A curious experiment was made lately with some students in an Art school, to prove the fallacy of the accepted system of describing landscapes, buildings, and the like in words. A page or two from one of the Waverley novels (a description of a castle and the heights of mountainous land, with a river winding in the valley towards the sea, and clusters of houses and trees on the right hand) was read slowly and repeated before a number of students, three of whom, standing apart from each other by pre-arrangement, proceeded to indicate on blackboards before an audience the leading lines of the picture as the words had presented it to their minds. It is needless to say that the results, highly skilful in one case, were all different, and all wrong; and that in particular the horizon line of the sea (so easy to indicate with any clue, and so important to the composition) was hopelessly out of place. Thus we describe day by day, and the pictures formed in the mind are erroneous, for the imagination of the reader is at work at once, and requires simple guidance. The exhibition was, I need hardly say, highly stimulating and suggestive.
Many arguments might be used for the substitution of pictorial for verbal methods of expression, which apply to books as well as periodicals. Two may be mentioned of a purely topical kind.
1. In June, 1893, when the strife of political parties ran high in England, and anything like a rapprochement between their leaders seemed impossible, Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Balfour were seen in apparently friendly conversation behind the Speaker’s chair in the House of Commons. A newspaper reporter in one of the galleries, observing the interesting situation, does not say in so many words, that “Mr. G. was seen talking to Mr. B.,” but makes, or has made for him, a sketch (without caricature) of the two figures standing talking together, and writes under it, “Amenities behind the Speaker’s chair.” Here it will be seen that the subject is approached with more delicacy, and the position indicated with greater force through the pictorial method.
2. The second modern instance of the power—the eloquence, so to speak, of the pictorial method—appeared in the pages of Punch on the occasion of the visit of the Russian sailors to Paris in October, 1893. A rollicking, dancing Russian bear, with the words “Vive la République” wound round his head, hit the situation as no words could have done, especially when exposed for sale in the kiosques of the Paris boulevards. The picture required no translation into the languages of Europe.
It may be said that there is nothing new here—that the political cartoon is everywhere—that it has existed always, that it flourished in Athens and Rome, that all history teems with it, that it comes down to us on English soil through Gillray, Rowlandson, Hogarth, Blake, and many distinguished names. I draw attention to these things because the town is laden with newspapers and illustrated sheets. The tendency of the time seems to be to read less and less, and to depend more upon pictorial records of events. There are underlying reasons for this on which we must not dwell; the point of importance to illustrators is the fact that there is an insatiable demand for “pictures” which tell us something quickly and accurately, in a language which every nation can understand.
Another example of the use of pictorial expression to aid the verbal. A traveller in the Harz Mountains finds himself on the Zeigenkop, near Blankenberg, on a clear summer’s day, and thus describes it in words:—
“We are now on the heights above Blankenberg, a promontory 1,360 feet above the plains, with an almost uninterrupted view of distant country looking northward and eastward. The plateau of mountains on which we have been travelling here ends abruptly. It is the end of the upper world, but the plains seem illimitable. There is nothing between us and our homes in Berlin—nothing to impede the view which it is almost impossible to describe in words. The setting sun has pierced the veil of mist, and a map of Northern Germany seems unrolled before us, distant cities coming into view one by one. First, we see Halberstadt with its spires, then Magdeburg, then another city, and another.
“We have been so occupied with the distant prospect, and with the objects of interest which give character to it, that we had almost overlooked the charming composition and suggestive lines of this wonderful view. There is an ancient castle on the heights, the town of Blankenberg at our feet, a strange wall of perpendicular rocks in the middle distance; there are the curves of the valleys, flat pastures, undulating woods, and roads winding away across the plains. The central point of interest is the church spire with its cluster of houses spreading upwards towards the château, with its massive terraces fringed with trees, &c., &c.”
This was all very well in word-painting, but what a veil is lifted from the reader’s eyes by some such sketch as the one below.
VIEW ABOVE BLANKENBERG, HARZ MOUNTAINS.
It should be mentioned that three photographic prints joined together would hardly have given the picture, owing to the vast extent of this inland view, and the varying atmospheric effects.
The last instance I can give here is an engraving from Cassell’s Popular Educator, where a picture is used to demonstrate the curvature of the world’s surface; thus imprinting, for once, and for always, on the young reader’s mind a fact which words fail to describe adequately.
THE CURVATURE OF THE WORLDS SURFACE.
This is “The Art of Illustration” in the true sense of the word.
[3] The quotations are from a paper by the present writer, read before the Society of Arts in March, 1875.
[4] This system of reporting rifle contests is now almost universal in England.
[5] It seems strange that enterprising newspapers, with capital at command, such as the New York Herald, Daily Telegraph, and Pall Mall Gazette, should not have developed so obvious a method of transmitting information. The Pall Mall Gazette has been the most active in this direction, but might do much more.
[6] It has been well said that if a building can be described in words, it is not worth describing at all!