Prints: A Brief Review of Their Technique and History

by Emil H. Richter

IV
ITALY

The sixteenth century brings new developments to be noted, new factors to be considered. In Germany it rings in the culmination of artistic development under the leadership of Albrecht Dürer, whose towering personality lifts both engraving and woodcut to high levels of excellence. The cultivation of the technique of engraving has carried Germany far and away beyond the South, in a technical perfection duly appreciated in Italy; and when the demand for prints grows, when they become a marketable article, the Italian engraver copies German prints in order to gain the requisite technical knowledge. This Italian engraver, however, is not a painter-engraver as in Germany, an artist, namely, engraving his own designs. We know that the Italian artist continues intent on grander tasks and indifferent to the charms of the graver, hence a division of labor: the busy painter jots down the sketch or cartoon and the professional engraver undertakes the lengthy task of transferring, of interpreting the artist’s drawing by means of the graver. The subtle continuity of thought, from the first conception to the finished plate, which we prize in original engraving, is necessarily destroyed in such collaboration, but the engraver, working exclusively on the copper plate, is able infinitely to vary and develop the resources of the process by dint of practice. A noted instance of such collaboration is found in the “Death of Dido,” engraved after Raphael’s design by Marcantonio Raimondi. The lifework of Marcantonio is mainly devoted to the reproduction of sketches of the great Urbinate, whose genius inspires the engraver and lifts him to the highest rank in sixteenth-century Italy. His pliable graver, trained by much copying after Dürer and other Northern masters, delicately outlines the figures. The shade-strokes follow and accent in easy curves the rounding forms and the gradations of light and shade. There is variety in the line, no longer the uniform diagonal shading of the early period. It is, in a word, excellent engraving, which is seen likewise in his “Adam and Eve,” after a figure sketch of Raphael. The latter print shows also the pitfalls which await the thoughtless copyist. Raphael’s cartoon for this print shows the two lovely figures without any background whatever; Marcantonio, always at a loss without a definite model to copy, looked for a suitable background, and found it in a German print which he faithfully pieced in, peasant houses and all, as a setting for Adam and Eve!

DEATH OF DIDO

Marcantonio Raimondi

ADAM AND EVE

Marcantonio Raimondi

About this time the publisher of prints appears, buying plates from engravers and publishing them, centralizing a commerce which—before this—had been carried on by the engraver himself or by the artist who employed him. This commercial factor lowers the standard of engraving, both by the choice of subjects demanded of the engraver, with a view mainly to a ready sale, and by the quality of work tolerated. The only excuse for some of the plates published must have been their cheapness. Under these conditions and, moreover, at a time when painting was rapidly declining, one cannot look to the graphic arts for masterpieces. Venice, it is true, is yet in her glory; encouraged by the interest of Titian, woodcut flourishes for a while at the hands of Boldrini and others. As to engraving, Venetian art demanded of it a technique strongly expressive of color; a new impetus was needed for a revival of the medium. This was supplied by engravers from the Netherlands, where the technique of engraving had been highly elaborated in this the latter part of the sixteenth century. A noted representative of this Italian revival is the painter-engraver Agostino Carracci. If we examine this portrait of Titian, engraved after the great master’s own painting, Carracci’s skill in engraving will be at once apparent. Long parallel strokes, close together, give a rich deep hue to cloak and cap. The brown fur trimming, with its loose, broad handling, contrasts effectively with the delicate work on beard and hair. The short, swelling stroke used in the light background, the clear, transparent cross-hatching on the cheek, all denote great advance in differentiating this variety of textures.