One characteristic was shared in common by all early chiaroscurists; their work always reproduced drawings, usually in exact size. Jackson added a new dimension to the medium in 1735 by beginning to work after oil paintings.[11] His attempt to convey their scale, solidity, and tonal range, while retaining the woodcut’s breadth of execution, was perhaps carrying the chiaroscuro into complexities for which it was not suited. The method called for extraordinary talents in planning, drawing, cutting, and printing, and it resulted in impressions that could not escape a certain heaviness of effect when compared with traditional work. Jackson’s prints in this style are both daring and original, but no later woodcutter had either the desire or the temerity to follow his example. The method remained a dead end in chiaroscuro.
Tailpiece in L’Histoire naturelle éclaircie dans une de ses parties principales, l’oryctologie, by D. d’Argenville, De Bure, Paris, 1755. This is one of the cuts Jackson made between 1725-1730. Actual size. [Enlarged view.]
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[ Jackson and His Work]
[ England: Obscure Beginnings]
Little is known of Jackson’s early years. It is assumed that he was born in England about 1700, although many accounts, probably based upon Nagler, have him born in 1701. Papillon[12] conjectures that he studied painting and engraving on wood with “an English painter” named “Ekwits,” but is not sure he remembers the name correctly. He believes this artist engraved most of the head pieces and ornaments in Mattaire’s Latin Classics, published by J. and R. Tonson and J. Watts in London, 1713, and remarks on similarities with Jackson’s style. Chatto[13] believes these cuts were executed by Elisha Kirkall, interpreting the initials EK appearing on one of the prints to refer to this engraver rather than to “Ekwits.” He goes on to assume that Kirkall also engraved the blocks for Croxall’s edition of Aesop’s Fables, 1722, by the same publisher, and adds that Jackson was probably his apprentice and might have had some share in their execution. Most accounts of Jackson, taking Chatto’s word, note him as a pupil of Kirkall.
Linton[14] believes that only Kirkall or Jackson could have made the cuts, “unless some Sculptor ignotus is to be credited with that most notable book of graver-work in relief preceding the work of Bewick.”