Emily Jackson

“ In the picture of a blind man we see by the tilt of the chin, the angle of the head, that, like all so afflicted, the man is exercising senses which are dormant in those who have sight. The simple black outline of the American deaf and dumb poet Nack, by this master-cutter, is instinct with the patient silence of the dumb, the aloofness of the deaf. Fine oil paintings and miniatures give us a man or woman interpreted through the senses of the artist and idealised or distorted through the alchemy of the artist’s mind. ”

“ Surely it is high time the art of black profile portraiture had a historian of its own and the great masters of silhouette portraiture were rescued from oblivion. Shadows are impalpable things which fade away almost before we are aware of their existence.
Year by year accident and the ravages of time lessen the number of these fragile curios; the beautiful portraits on ivory and glass, being the most fragile, are the first to go. Already it is not easy to find good examples in their original frames complete with convex glass and trade label of the artist pasted on the back. ”

“ At its best, black profile portraiture is a thing of real beauty, almost worthy to take its place with the best miniature painting; at its worst, it is a quaintly appealing handicraft, revealing the fashions and foibles, the intimate domestic life and conventions of its day. It was executed by so many distinguished amateurs, from Etienne de Silhouette himself to Queen Charlotte and Princess Elizabeth of England, that few social histories or collections of letters of the eighteenth century fail to show how its strange chequer fitted into the fashionable life of the period. ”

“ This is perhaps one of the loveliest embodiments of the miniature shadow portrait, created independently of all shadow tracing, for the portrait is simply painted on the inside of a convex glass; yet the shade is there, dainty, alluring, created through the workings of one of nature’s laws; the brushwork becomes of secondary importance, and nature’s shadow the likeness. ”

“ Even the most ignorant in art work could trace a shadow when thrown upon white paper on a wall or specially made screen, and if the full life-size were considered too large, the Singe, pantograph, or other contrivance could reduce its size; then only scissors were required, and the silhouette-by-machinery maker felt himself to be as gifted as the black portrait painter, or the freehand scissor-cutter, whose work we describe in another chapter. ”

“ Glass, ivory, and plaster, oil-painting, smoke-staining, and Indian ink, all were used one by one or together. There is no evolution and gradual development to trace in the art and craft of the silhouettist; the pictures come before us like the shadows that they are, each process appearing and disappearing. Sometimes the same man worked in half a dozen different processes, using now one and now another, according to the taste or purse of the sitter, or guided by his own judgment as to the suitability of his subject for this or that medium of expression. ”

“ It is the exception rather than the rule for silhouettes to be signed, whatever the process chosen. Connoisseurs are enabled by careful study to recognise at a glance examples of well-known silhouettists, such as Miers, Rosenberg, Mrs. Beetham, or Edouart, by their treatment of hair or some slight characteristic touch; but as a rule the shadow pageant passes before us nameless, elusive. We hope to rescue from final obscurity some of the names of the lesser men, and perhaps the list, however incomplete, may help owners to identify the originals of these shadow sitters of the past. ”

“ In a book of instructions for the amateur silhouettists of Germany, published in Frankfurt and Leipzig by Philip Heinrich Perrenon, bookseller, of Münster, 1780, we are told: “One can use tinfoil for the ornamentation of silhouettes for hanging. When the glass is turned round, the places where the tinfoil is form a sort of mirror. If the background be black and the portrait the mirror, the effect is pretty, but it is as contrary to nature as a white shadow. It is best to have the ground of looking-glass, and to blacken or colour the silhouette.” ”

“ If fresh interest is kindled in the graceful art of the silhouettist, and the names of some little known artists are rescued from oblivion, my pleasant task will not have been in vain. Perhaps those who read these pages will find a charm and wistfulness in the shadow portrait. ”

“ The silhouette portrait produced by the brush on ivory, card, or plaster is not necessarily the highest type, although it approaches most nearly to the work of the miniature painter, for the technique of one or two of the cutters, such as Edouart, is so fine that it lifts this humbler process on to the highest plane. Many miniature painters of the eighteenth century worked alternately in black profile portraiture and colour. ”

“ That silhouettes are kept in the reference library of our National Portrait Gallery, because, on account of their life-like resemblance, they are of great value to the authorities in the identification of unknown portraits, is a fact which speaks for the great historic value of these pictorial records. In the cuttings of Edouart there is the ego of the man or woman as well as the bodily form. A gesture, the poise of the body, the arrested movement of the limbs, are shown with more than photographic correctness—when photography was as yet unborn. ”

“ I cannot avoid making my observations concerning profile likenesses taken by patent machines, which possess sometimes all the various colours of the rainbow: for example, every day there is to be seen in the shops this kind of profile, with gold hair drawn on them, coral earrings, blue necklaces, white frills, green dress, and yellow waistband, etc. Is it not ridiculous to see such harlequinades? The face, being quite black, forms such a contrast that everyone looks like a negro! I cannot understand how persons can have so bad and, I may say, a childish taste! ”

“ No less remarkable is the head-dressing of the ladies, and the elaboration of the curls and coifs is only eclipsed by the [80] intricacy of the flowers, feathers, bows of ribbon gauze and taffeta with which the great erections are garnished. Even when there is no gilt pencilling to throw up the detail, the effect is marvellously interesting; and, for this reason alone, the old black shadow collections make a very absorbing study. ”

“ The cuttings usually show groups of children, reminding us of Buck’s work of contemporary date; or of animals, sometimes alone, and sometimes set in a landscape of such elaboration that one wonders how so great an effect can be packed into the two square inches of paper, which is often the size of the complete silhouette picture. It would be unusual to find so much and such accurate detail in a pen-and-ink drawing; the fact that the picture is cut out with a pair of scissors or a penknife makes it the more extraordinary. ”

“ The nervous delicacy of the work equals that of Miers: the manipulation of accessories excels it when she is at her best.
These silhouette jewels, of fine quality, are very rare, and are much sought after. Unfortunately, like so many of our beautiful and artistic treasures, the boundless wealth of America is absorbing many good examples. Is it possible that a frame containing about forty of the finest examples of Field’s work went to America before the collection came up for public inspection in the auction room, when the Guest collection was dispersed? ”

“ The handbill which lies before us advertises his art as “Papyrolomia”—a terrible word, which doubtless had its uses in whetting the appetite of the public by mystifying them and suggesting terrifying adventures. This leaflet is illustrated with a grotesque figure, which has obviously been some of the printer’s stock-in-trade, for it is hardly germane to the subject of silhouette cutting, nor could it be the portrait of a scissor-worker of such tender years as Master Hubard, though this artist is only a secondary attraction in the show. ”

“ There is a simplicity in the silhouette picture which brings it nearer to the Japanese print in its effect upon the mind than any other expression in art. All our attention is concentrated on outline, and in consequence there is a directness and vigour in the likeness which are lacking in more complex studies. Some Japanese artists, recognising this peculiar quality in the black profile portrait, supplement a conventionally drawn coloured portrait with a silhouette. ”

“ Of all those who cut the likeness direct after glancing at the sitter, the Frenchman, August Edouart, was undoubtedly the most skilful and prolific. He styles himself “Silhouettist to the French Royal Family. Patronised by His Royal Highness the late Duke of Gloucester and the principal nobility of England, Scotland, and Ireland.” When he first came to England as a refugee, he seems to have supported himself by a strange industry, invented by himself, which he calls mosaic hair-work. ”

“ The searcher who hopes to be successful in his quest has now to go very far afield, unless he be satisfied with the paper pictures of indifferent quality, interesting perhaps on account of the identity of the sitter or the fame of the cutter, but very far from equalling in beauty the best work of the masters in black profile portraiture. Some enthusiasts maintain that the least artistic profile shadow portrait has a curious individuality which redeems it from overwhelming ugliness ”

“ Any of these processes require a good deal of artistic training, even if the shade is used as a guide, for unless there is skill in catching a likeness, or delicacy and charm in drawing, black portraiture has nothing whatever to recommend it. However the silhouette is executed, the mechanical appliances play so important a part in nearly all the processes that they need a chapter to themselves. In order to popularise the black portrait, some means of achieving it was required which could be used by persons without talent or artistic training. ”

“ The method most usual for profile portraits in minute size is the painting with Indian ink on ivory or plaster. We have seen these as small as a pea, but this is unusual; they are generally double that size for rings, or, for lockets and brooches, larger still.
J. Miers must have painted many of these jewels. Amongst the examples we have examined, some are plain black, probably of early date; some pencilled with gold. This process we cannot help surmising to have been a concession on the part of the artist to the popular demand which came early in the nineteenth century. ”

“ The fact that Goëthe was for a time enthusiastic with regard to Lavater’s work casts a glamour over the little book, with its many pictures and vast store of minutely written notes.
Another album, which is also in Mr. Wellesley’s collection, is most elaborate. Each page has a finely wrought border, in the centre of which is pasted the silhouette portrait of a friend; the male sex is largely in the majority, but a few women’s profiles are included. ”

“ Though the cutting out with scissors and penknife sometimes took the form of landscape groups and small whole figures, the profile alone in small, though not miniature size, proved the most fascinating branch of scissor-work, and survived the longest in the favour of amateurs, because the purely mechanical shadow tracing required no skill, and inevitably gave a life-like likeness if traced with reasonable care. ”

“ In China silhouette plays always represent a priest of Buddha as the central figure, and he is made to dance in imitation of the movements made in the performance of religious rites.
On the night of the festival of Diwali in India men exhibit a huge cylindrical paper lantern, over the sides of which shadow figures pass in succession, so that Gonard’s lamp in the Palais Royal, that was decorated with silhouettes to guide his clients to his salon, might have come straight from the East. ”

“ For the palmy days of the silhouette theatre we must look a long way down the centuries, and the recent astounding find of a large collection of ancient figures used in the shadow plays of old Egypt enables us to actually see how the Egyptian figures looked and how they worked. ”

“ John Miers, whose silhouette of Robert Burns is in the National Portrait Gallery of Edinburgh, worked at Leeds, and afterwards had headquarters in the Strand, opposite Exeter Change, where he was in partnership for many years with John Field, another silhouettist, whose work is of very fine quality. On most of Miers’ work he is described as “late of Leeds.” His early business label in Leeds is extremely rare. It is on a fine portrait of a man which lies before us. This is painted on plaster, and, like nearly all his early work, is untouched with gold. ”

“ Beauty, he continues, has respect to form. Now, one part of a figure may exhibit a beautiful form, and yet that figure may not be well proportioned throughout. For instance, a man may have a handsome leg, or arm, considered in itself, but the other parts of his figure may not equal this part in beauty, or this part may not be accurately proportioned to the rest of the figure; and so on through many pages, in which Edouart proves to his own satisfaction that, in order to give a correct shade likeness of a person, it is necessary to portray the whole and not one part only of that person. ”

“ As the oldest type of black profile representation is undoubtedly connected with the decoration of pottery, it is not to be wondered at that when silhouette-making by brush, pencil, or scissors was at the height of its popularity, a return should be made in style to the antique. ”

“ Even when such success rewarded the efforts of Edouart, he is still in apologetic mood with regard to his art, and declares that if his work had not been good the French Royal Family would not have encouraged it. “They had seen a great quantity of those common (machine-made) black shades in Paris, and had also a great dislike to them, which was soon removed when they saw the nature of mine.” He is never able to refrain from a sneer at the other silhouettists. ”