The art of engraving on metal plates is not new. It is mentioned in the Bible in the twenty-eighth chapter of Exodus, thirty-sixth verse. The Israelites probably learned the art from the Egyptians, for they, as well as the Assyrians, engraved upon both stone and metal. Copper engravings have been found in mummy cases. The Egyptians do not seem to have thought of printing from these plates, however. In India and China the art dates back to remote times. Marco Polo describes money made in China by stamping it with a seal covered with vermilion.
THE SUGGESTIONS TO TEACHERS
Studying pictures. A few days before a picture is to be studied, it should be placed where all members of the class can see it.
As a preparation for the lessons on Illustration and Cartoons, pupils should be told at least a week in advance, so that they may save good examples to bring to class.
Most teachers seem to feel that the pupils are more interested in this work when it is prepared and presented by members of the class. Equally good results, however, are sometimes secured when the teacher provides the subject-matter and leads the discussion.
Pupils are sometimes able to bring in specimens of copper, steel, or zinc plates, and if a friend or a member of some pupil’s family is a printer, engraver, or lithographer, permission may be obtained for the class to visit his place of business. In that case, a visit would be much more beneficial than a classroom lesson.
Visits to an art museum, when possible, are equally instructive. Pupils of grammar-school age have a tendency to criticize pictures, or, perhaps we should say, to make remarks about them which often cause others to laugh. This practice soon grows into a habit which, unfortunately, is not confined to children alone, as any visit to an exhibition of paintings will show. I have used the following little story many times and found it helped to discourage this habit: The students at an art school in New York were taken for their first visit to the great Metropolitan Art Gallery. It was their first week at school, and they were strangers to the city, to the school, to the teacher, and, with but few exceptions, to each other. The afternoon passed all too quickly. The next day their instructor began to question them. What did they think of this picture? Of that? The first pupil gave a severe criticism of the picture mentioned, as did his neighbor and others in the class. Were they not there to study art and to learn how to tell what is wrong in pictures? Suddenly they were amazed to find their instructor laughing heartily at them.
“There,” she said, “you have done just what beginners always do. You have looked only for faults, and you have found faults.”
She then tried to tell them that until they could learn to put themselves in the artist’s place and to see with his eyes, so to speak, the picture he wished to paint (which is always infinitely less than the picture he does paint) they could not hope to appreciate his picture. They were advised to study carefully two or three pictures which appealed to them and to leave the others until greater knowledge, gained through experience, travel, pain, or pleasure, should make it possible for them to understand the message of the artist.