Arthur Hayden

“ In an examination of European art one wonders where imitation ends and where originality begins. Originality unfortunately often begins just at that point when the original touch of genius is lost sight of and when banal excrescences are added, meaningless and offensive.
But originality and fertility of design often begin when experimentalists set out to produce one thing and realized another, and commenced a new technique and became original in so doing. ”

“ The elongated handle striking a sharp acute angle adjacent to the edge of the broad facetted body offers a inharmonious note. The space between the handle and the body is not a pleasing space to the eye. In technique the jug is perfect, as perfect as the silversmiths could fashion it, and as representative a replica as Sheffield could turn out. The eye wanders to the upper portion and finds restfulness, and it is this upper portion which makes the jug lovable and beautiful. ”

“ One never grows weary of contemplating such a perfect example as this of the art of the modern metal worker, that is modern since the old days of Greece and Rome, and modern as in comparison with the outburst of the great Italian Renaissance. ”

“ The silver wire following the intricate outlines of a vessel disguising the raw edges of the copper, was used in a manner unequalled by the craftsman in silver plate because he had no need of such artifices to conceal in his technique the poverty of the base. He was working in a solid metal where no base metal at every conceivable point thrust itself into prominence. He could engrave deeply with no possibility of going too deep and betraying the shining copper. His applied ornament was solid silver, and here the Sheffield plater runs parallel in regard to die work and soldering parts together. ”

“ Examples of Irish work are sometimes apparently simple, but having such careful technique and skilful manipulation of the design as to give the greatest opportunity for the effective play of light and shade and silhouette. Another form more intricate embraced the use of birds and flowers and miniature pastoral scenes embossed, while a more simple form yet capable of fine character was that which confined itself to basket work with round or flat wire interlaced. ”

“ He kept an eye, too, on the plate closet, and knew to a nicety what particular services and what special vessels fitted functions over which he presided. Perhaps life has become more complex for him to-day, possibly he now pays more attention to his golf clubs and his motor-car. He has more extraneous pleasures, and after all modernity has its claims on his time. He may suffer less from gout than did his sires. But as a giver of a feast, as a host with inner knowledge, as a man sensitive for the palates of his guests, the modern host is not the same host as was his grandfather. ”

“ Imitation as a fine art—Economic substitution—European imitativeness—Parallels in English craftsmanship—Early plating—Silver platers at Sheffield.
Imitation is no new thing in art. Indeed it may be advanced as an axiom that no art worthy of the name has ever come into being without inheriting the traditions and technique of some preceding motifs. Bizarre movements have at one time and another seized artists and craftsmen, they have become anarchist in regard to all previous art postulates, and produced somewhat chaotic and formless results. ”

“ Sometimes, happily for the buckle makers, the fashions grew so extravagant that the ladies wore such large square buckles either of silver or silver plated as almost to conceal their feet. Towards the end of the century fashion deserted the buckle makers and they were in a parlous state. It was natural that they termed the displacement "the most ridiculous of all ridiculous fashions the effeminate shoe string." Birmingham, Walsall and Wolverhampton employed no less than twenty thousand workers in the buckle industry, and they could ill afford to be flouted by the fickle jade Fashion. ”

“ The square base with ball feet, the simple festoon of drapery, encircling rosettes but not being supported by them, the band of ribbed ornament placed just at that position where it attains the maximum effect, the fine exquisitely balanced proportions of the neck as natural and wonderful as nature in graceful birds such as the swan, and the pleasing lines in the curve of the spout—all these points are points of beauty impossible to describe in words, but quick to strike the trained eye satiated with improper ornament and feverishly awaiting the advent of pure unalloyed beauty of form. ”

“ Antonio Zucchi painted his drawing-room ceiling, and a white marble mantelpiece chimney piece cost three hundred pounds. Great engravers were working in mezzotint and in line: stipple engravers under Bartolozzi's influence produced gems of English art printed in colours. A great outburst of work of permanent artistic quality stamps the period. Nor were the silversmiths behind in perpetuating glorious designs. Here then was the fine field in which the Sheffield platers could browse for inspiration. Their results justify their existence. ”

“ Veneers have in modern days been so skilfully made until they are no thicker than a cigarette paper, the modern glue and the modern processes have worked on scientific lines, although in many respects they have not outrivalled the old worker in veneers. Similarly, in Sheffield plate, the great note of exclamation, surprising and wonderful, is at the wire edged work, the handling of dies in a subtle and delicate manner, and the great result produced by a difficult technique. ”

“ The metalsmiths on the Continent were by no means deficient in originality. For centuries in Italy and in Holland, in Germany and in France, some of the finest workers in gold and silver, in brass and iron, artists in jewels and in enamel, had won a great renown. It is somewhat flattering to find that the foreigner saw, what perhaps was less recognized in the country of its origin, that the work of the Sheffield silver platers stood on a plane apart. And their flattering attentions were not only confined to purchasing replicas of fine English silver. ”

“ They are undoubtedly old and of fine quality. It should be the ideal of the collector to know the technique of his subject so well that the artistic beauty and the skilful craftsmanship of an example should make its appeal to his trained scrutiny irrespective as to whether there is any maker's mark on the piece or not. The seams on old pieces showing joins are a far better test of old workmanship as between old Sheffield plating and modern electro-plating. These seams are the hall marks of the makers a century and a century and a half ago. ”

“ Hot Water Jugs.—The form of the jug offers endless possibilities to the artist who designs practical shapes that the metal worker, the glass-blower, or the potter can bring into being, each according to his technique. It is the duty of the artist, if he be practical as well as ideal, to offer only such designs as can be easily worked in the particular craft for which he is drawing his designs. In regard to narrow-necked vessels there is the suggestion that they are more suited to the potter than to the metal worker. ”

“ Commercialism was in the air, and at the flood the old methods of plating by fusion were swept away.
The Factory System.—Looked at from all points of view the Sheffield plating industry betrayed the rise of the factory system, as did also the great Wedgwood and other Staffordshire firms. The factory system, by reason of its systemization, apportions set tasks to a chain of individuals, so that no one individual can be said to be an artist-craftsman in the same sense that he would have been in the old days. ”

“ In regard to plating on copper or any other baser metal the worker can employ silver in any proportion he may desire. But he is required by law "to place upon each of his works his own punch determined by the Mint (as stated in article above quoted) . He shall also add to the stamp numerals indicating the quantity of silver contained in his work, on which also shall be impressed in full the word doublé." And this is exactly what the French craftsmen have done as shown by the illustrated marks given in Appendix (p. 291) . ”

“ So that there is every reason why at Sheffield, the workmen who executed the mouldings and the craftsmen who pierced the design or chased it, should have added their initials. The die sinker might go by the board, but the artisan who with the highest art concealed art with his die work and his wire, he too might place his sign. There are [233]
[235]
[237] workmen's marks, but nowadays they mean nothing except that they are "workmen's marks." On Worcester porcelain it is the same, certain symbols are believed to be workmen's marks. That is all. The French were wiser. ”

“ The oval bases and the touch of floriate ornament under the nozzle urns have their indicative note. It will be observed that the camera, with more penetration than the human eye, has brought out the thinness of the plate, and it is here represented in the illustration. It denotes perhaps less of a delinquency on the part of the plater or a flaw in his technique than a grave indictment against generations of housemaids who have used metal polish which contained mercury or some other noxious compound inimical to the longevity of the superimposed silver. ”

“ When the fashion for the classic designs of the Adam period and that immediately succeeding it was found to have been discarded, these old dies were melted down for the value of the metal. They represented many thousands of pounds outlay to each of the firms who had produced them, and nowadays, when reticence and sobriety of design have again come into their own after the long night of the early and later Victorian meaningless trivialities in design in metal work, these old dies would have won distinction by their re-employment. ”

“ In regard to Foreign marks on silver plated ware that was produced in the method of old Sheffield, there are examples known to have been made in France and in Russia, and it is believed that they were also made in Holland and in Sweden. The promulgation of the old Pattern Books by Sheffield at the end of the eighteenth century doubtless had an influence on metal workers on the Continent, who were never slow in assimilating new processes, especially when they offered, as did Sheffield, a lessened cost of production and an appearance simulating something finer. ”

“ The old Italian masters compounded their own pigments and carved and gilded their own frames. Life was then more crystallized. The viciousness of the factory system was that it destroyed the personality of the craftsman. In latter days strong movements have been inaugurated to attempt to revive art industries where the artist craftsmen will not be obliterated under the name of a firm or a syndicate.
The End of the Story.—It has been shown throughout this volume that old Sheffield plate by reason of its artistic excellence, should be treasured and loved. ”

“ Stage by stage the Sheffield platers increased their facility for cunning handicraft. Machinery they had, and clean-cut differentiation of task. In fact the various branches soon became specialized in such a great industry. There were the die sinkers, and the workmen who fashioned dies and the workmen who fitted them ingeniously in position were others than those who soldered candlesticks together. ”

“ The soup tureen that is insignificant is a cruse that promiseth no oil. It betokeneth poverty of invention and it might better be an earthern crock which fortune might mayhap endow with golden contents.
Perhaps the silversmiths have imagined all this or carried on a train of thought resulting in producing soup tureens of fine design and imposing character, and Sheffield has followed with her replicas and as the needle follows the pole.
We must look to Paul Lamerie, to Peter Archambo in the early period and Paul Storr at the end of the century for silver prototypes. ”

“ It was in the year 1743 that a fortunate accident led to the discovery that copper and silver could be fused together, and happily the value of the momentary happening led to the further development of the process and the final perfected invention of plating silver on copper which laid the foundation of a great and flourishing art industry which brought wealth and renown to Sheffield and extended to other centres. ”

“ Their hearts bleeding at the cruel inconsiderate capriciousness of Fashion; difficulties and impossibilities rise in quick succession to defeat the probability of fixing on any other branch or occupation. The nuptial tie, pitiably relaxed by reiterated sorrows; the children cry louder and more vehemently for food; the husband unmanned; his wonted courage fails; the wife, more delicately sensible, is not able to resist one of the obtruding woes which crowd upon her mind. ”

“ Undoubtedly Staffordshire and all its products struck hard at the English porcelain factories. But, in spite of its initial imitativeness and its wary regard for competitive lines, it did win a path of its own. There the parallel ceases because earthenware was made in England prior to porcelain.
Imitativeness in various arts is common enough. The glass-worker and the potter copied the silversmith. The cabinet-maker was indebted to both and vice versa. We find acanthus ornament in wood and in metal, the strapwork of the Tudor carver on wood and on silver. ”

“ Economic Substitution.—But imitation has many phases. Modern photography in copying the great works of old masters has made it possible to study their works with exactitude in the dimensions of black and white, and if the work is an etching or an engraving the reproduction claims a closer relationship with the original. The art of engraving from painters' work is imitative to the extent that it depicts the same subject and takes its initial inspiration from the painted canvas. ”

“ The point arises as to whether the Sheffield platers themselves made these slight variations in design, adding here a piece of chasing and there a chain of festoons, each article having this slight variation from its fellow, or whether they were actually following the silversmiths' designs in silver plate where similar variations may have been made. We do not know. It is a moot point. If we cannot find in silver, and examples have not always been found to agree exactly with Sheffield plate reproductions, all that we know Sheffield produced we are on the horns of a dilemma. ”

“ And without doubt old Sheffield plate, especially in examples that are not forthcoming as having been made in silver plate, will command much higher prices in the future. English earthenware in some instances has eclipsed porcelain in regard to prices under the hammer, and engravings after paintings in oil finely executed in a masterly technique, never again to be equalled or attempted, have won a greater acclamation at auction than the originals. Technique is a factor and a great determining factor in collecting, and sound connoisseurship recognizes this. ”

“ The candelabrum illustrated has a stand consisting of three tapering legs reeded, and ending in claw feet. This supports an urn which in its turn supports another, which latter can be used as a light. From the lower urn proceed three branches, spread out in triangular manner.
A later candelabrum with two arms and centre light, illustrated (p. 121) betrays every sign of bad design. The floral scroll work is hard and offensive. The leaf and shell ornament at base is equally unsatisfactory. It was this form that survived as it came on the threshold of the era of illumination by coal-gas. ”

“ But the assay offices established at Sheffield and Birmingham were to be "The Guardians of the Standard of Wrought Plate," which is suggestive in the circumstances.
Competitive rivalry in art has often ended in the undoing of a particular school where imitation was pushed to fulsome lengths. When the wood engraver simulated the actual cracks in the canvases of the subjects he was copying on his block he showed a decadence which shortly led to his extinction. But the Sheffield platers never added blemishes of their own to the silver they copied. ”

“ Take another example still in date about 1790 (illustrated, p. 101) ; here the base is an urn and the single-candle standard form nothing very especially removed from a design very beloved by the brass turners of a slightly later date. But it is the branched form which commands respect as a piece of decorative ornament. Its C-shape spirals interlace at centre and form a pleasing ornament. Its simplicity and grace are at once apparent. It has the practicability that it is not readily injured by ill-usage. Its wearing parts are confined to a narrow space. ”

“ We speak of pre-war days when we have seen at Solingen much that should shame Sheffield.
In the early knife handles illustrated (p. 51) the sheet is very thin, and the design is stamped and both halves of the handle soldered together. The thin pointed steel blade is characteristic of old examples. It had not yet arrived to the stage of the trade mark with name of firm "made in Sheffield." There is a fault in design. The object of ornament is to be seen and admired. When these knives were set on a table, the head of Shakespeare in the medallion was upside down. ”