Edward Fairbrother Strange

“ His treatment of most subjects was revolutionary; he deliberately ignored proportion and perspective, and the “freedom from convention” which he displayed caused his work to be judged with harshness. In certain phases of technique he especially excelled; and his earlier methods of dealing with the single line in conjunction with masses of black are in their way unsurpassed, except in the art of Japan, the country which probably gave his ideas some assistance. ”

“ Jacopo della Quercia’s work exercised a powerful influence on that of the artists of the later Italian Renaissance. He himself reflects not a little of the Gothic spirit, admirably intermixed with some of the best qualities of neo-classicism. He was an artist whose powers have hardly yet received the recognition they undoubtedly deserve.
See C. Cornelius, Jacopo della Quercia: eine Kunsthistorische Studie (1896) , and works relating generally to the arts in Siena. ”

“ The earlier prints by these artists, whose work can hardly be separated, are of extraordinary merit. They applied the process of colour block printing to the purposes of depicting landscape, with a breadth, skill and suitability of convention that has been equalled only by Hokusai in Japan, and by no European. Most of their subjects were derived from the neighbourhood of Yedo, or were scenes on the old high road—the Tokaidō—that ran from that city to Kiōto. ”