Webster. The Old Bridge, Frankfort
This old bridge spans the river Main between Frankfort and Sachsenhausen
“I would set this plate beside Les Blanchisseuses and Quai Montebello, which Mr. Wedmore has found ‘modestly perfect,’ as representing the very summit of Webster’s art.” Martin Hardie.
Size of the original etching, 5½ × 8½ inches
Webster. La Rue St. Jacques, Paris
“... One of the best etchings he has ever made.... It is not merely fine in its pattern of light and shade, but it has a direct force and simplification that are rich with promise for the future.” Martin Hardie.
Size of the original etching, 8⅝ × 5⅞ inches
While he has surrendered for the time being to the charm of Frankfort, Webster has not been unfaithful to the Paris of his early love. Of Paris he might say, like Montaigne, “That city has ever had my heart; and it has fallen out to me, as of excellent things, that the more of other fine cities I have seen since, the more the beauty of this gains on my affections. I love it tenderly, even with all its warts and blemishes.” All the more for the warts and blemishes of its old buildings Webster loves it, too; and while working on his Frankfort plates he has completed another of La Rue St. Jacques, Paris, which, I think, is one of the best etchings he has ever made. At times, even in his Frankfort plates, one still feels that his superb draughtsmanship and his love of detail—ce superflu, si nécessaire—have led him to a uniformity of finish that is almost too “icily regular.” I do not mean that Webster’s elaboration is the cold, almost meaningless, elaboration of the line-engraver; nor do I forget that the technique of Meryon, one of the greatest masters of etchings, was, in Mr. Wedmore’s happy phrasing, “one of unfaltering firmness and regularity, one of undeterred deliberation.” All the same, one wishes that Meryon had done a few more things like the Rue des Mauvais Garçons, and wishes that Webster also, in a similar way, were now and then less sure of himself, were held sometimes by a trembling hesitancy, or driven sometimes by the passion of the moment to allow room for fortunate accident and rapid suggestion. For that reason I welcome his Rue St. Jacques. It is not merely fine in its pattern of light and shade, but it has a direct force and simplification that are rich with promise for the future.