Line engraving

“ Line engraving in Europe does not owe its origin to the woodcut, but to the chasing on goldsmiths’ work. The goldsmiths of Florence in the middle of the 15th century were in the habit of ornamenting their works by means of engraving, after which they filled up the hollows produced by the burin with a black enamel made of silver, lead and sulphur, the result being that the design was rendered much more visible by the opposition of the enamel and the metal. ”

“ All the same, it is commonly the case with wood engravers that, clever though they be, they are apt to deceive themselves as to the special conditions of their art, and too often to forget that it is not their province to imitate the appearance of line engraving. Instead of attempting to copy the complicated results of the graver, they should rather, in accordance with the nature of the process at their disposal, be satisfied with rapid suggestions of effect and modelling and a summary imitation of form and colour. ”

“ In France, then, line engraving has representatives numerous enough, and above all meritorious enough, to put to rout the apprehensions of those who believe, or affect to believe, the art irretrievably injured by the success of heliography. ”

“ Like the knife, it removes the wood, consequently leaving a white line or dot wherever it has passed. Hence the term “white-line engraving,” often used for wood-engraving.
When we turn to the second great division, to the intaglio processes, we find that the recipe of the woodcut has to be just reversed to fit this new proposition. Consult the diagram of the three possibilities of printing; the cross-section of the relief-block presents a series of flat-topped ridges with valleys between them. ”

“ In the engraved wood block, as in the printing type, it is a projection in the wood or metal which, being inked and passed under a press, leaves on paper its lines in black. Naturally then the intercalation of an engraving of this kind in typographical composition is made without difficulty, and the impression of both is taken at once. On the other hand, a line engraving is obtained from incised lines on a plate of copper; that is, an instrument called a burin traces the lines, which are filled with greasy ink. ”

“ The first pull is then taken as in a line engraving with a copper-plate press, and its appearance shows what corrections are necessary. The plate nearly always requires a certain amount of engraving; the high lights may be improved by means of a burnisher, the shadows by means of a rocker or a roulette—a small steel wheel the rim of which is beset with fine teeth—and so on. Finally, if a large edition is required, the plate is steel faced.
Although much used for the reproduction of pictures, photogravure is too rarely employed for scientific purposes ”

“ In metal engraving, it is easier to lay a fine line than a thick one; and however fine the line may be, it lasts;—but in wood engraving it requires extreme precision and skill to leave a thin dark line, and when left, it will be quickly beaten down by a careless printer. Therefore, the virtue of wood engraving is to exhibit the qualities and power of thick lines ”

“ When the outlines of the drawing that is to be copied have been traced and transferred to a plate usually made of copper1 the metal is5 attacked with a sharp tool, called the dry-point. Then the trenches thus marked out are deepened, or fresh ones are made with the graver, which, owing to its shape, produces an angular incision. The appearance of every object represented in the original must be reproduced solely by these incised lines: at different distances apart, or tending in various directions: or by dots and cross-hatchings.
Line engraving possesses no other resources. ”

“ Instead of offering a flat, smooth surface, like the plates in line engraving, a mezzotint copper must be first grained by a steel tool (called the "rocker") , shaped like a chisel, with a semicircular blade which is bevelled and toothed. Sometimes (and this is generally the case in the present day) the "rocking" of the surface, on which the engraver is to work, is produced, not by a tool, but by a special machine. ”

“ It contains thin lines and thick ones, and a considerable variety of curves. An elaborate line engraving, if it is a pure line engraving and nothing else, will contain only these simple elements in different combinations. The real line engraver is always engraving a line more or less broad and deep in one direction or another; he has no other business than this.
In the early Italian and early German prints, the line is used with such perfect simplicity of purpose that the methods of the artists are as obvious as if we saw them actually at work. ”

“ Line engraving on a small scale plays an important part in book illustration. It is the simplest, and yet requires the most technical skill of all the methods of marking metal surfaces for the purpose of making prints. The engraver cuts out a thread of metal, producing a little track on the surface, and to do this properly requires the utmost skill. ”

“ Natural tones and textures could be imitated. The engraver was no longer a mere mechanical craftsman cutting around existing lines; special skill was needed to translate tones in terms of white lines of varying thickness and spacing. The opportunity also existed for each engraver to work his own tones in his own manner, to develop a personal system. In short, the medium served the same purpose as copper plate line engraving, with the added virtue that it could be printed together with type in one impression. ”

“ There are two kinds of engraving in his branch: the line engraving can be done with one tool, the other kind requires several. He can obtain foreigners who can do both kinds (usually called mongrel engraving) , and who would be glad to get work. Chasing and polishing are about as good mechanical pursuits as a woman can follow. Some silver chasing is done by filling the article with sand, and striking with proper tools; some is pressed with heavy machinery. Soft chasing is done on metals, but the chasing of plated ware requires some strength in the wrists, and is done before being plated. ”

“ In Germany, as might be expected, line-engraving retains not a little of its popularity in its more orthodox form. The novel Stauffer-Bern method, in which freedom and lightness are obtained with such delicacy that the fine lines, employed in great numbers, run into tone, and yield a supposed advantage in modelling, has not been without appreciation. But the more usual virtue of the graver has been best supported, and many have worked in the old-fashioned manner. ”

“ Technically one of these arts, that of line-engraving on copper, sprang from the craft of the goldsmith and metal-chaser; while that of wood-engraving sprang from the craft of the printers of pattern-blocks and playing cards. The engraver on metal habitually cut his own designs, and between the arts of the goldsmith and the painter there had always been a close alliance, both being habitually exercised by persons of the same family and sometimes by one and the same person ”

“ The principle of a print made from an engraved wood block is that the projecting parts are covered with a thin film of ink, and when the paper is lightly pressed down upon these lines it picks up the ink from the surface wherever it touches it. In the case of an engraved metal plate, the lines on which are cut in the same way and with a similar graver to that used for white line engraving on wood, the inking and printing is quite different. ”

“ Old or modern wood-engraving as a mode of reproducing designs in fac-simile is valuable, but none of the artistic merit they may possess is due to the engraver; while the artistic merit shown in the new style of wood-engraving, as an art of design in white line, belongs wholly to the engraver. It results from this that white line is the peculiar province of wood-engraving, considered as an art ”

“ Gradually, however, the various mechanical processes for facilitating the commercial extension of the art such as electrotyping71 photography, &c., brought here, too, their deteriorating effects, causing the engraver to become less of an artist and more of a mechanic. In delicacy of work and elaboration of detail, American artists now stand first among wood engravers; but they attempt too much with the means at their command, and try to produce upon the comparatively soft material, wood, the delicate fineness of line which can only be realised in perfection on metal. ”

“ Aside from these imitative cuts, the most striking portion of recent engraving, that which has been hailed as opening a new career to the art, is characterized either by a great refinement of line or by a practical abandonment of line. Of the former tendency Mr. Henry Marsh affords the most prominent examples by his engravings in illustration of insect life, or similarly delicate work. The skill of his hand and the charm of the style he has adopted are beyond question ”

“ There are still a few who can engrave a head from a photograph or drawing, or a small engraving for book-illustration or for book-plates; there are more who are highly proficient in mechanical engraving for decorative purposes; but the engraving-machine is fast superseding this class. In short, the art of worthily translating a fine painting beyond the borders of France, Belgium, Germany and perhaps Italy can scarcely be said to survive, and even in those countries it appears to exist on sufferance and by hot-house encouragement. ”

“ A screw is attached to the apparatus, so that if the medal be raised a very small quantity by the screw, the copperplate will be advanced by the same quantity, and thus a new line of section may be drawn: and, by continuing this process, the series of sectional lines on the copper produces the representation of the medal on a plane: the outline and the form of the figure arising from the sinuosities of the lines, and from their greater or less proximity. The effect of this kind of engraving is very striking; and in some specimens gives a high degree of apparent relief. ”

“ When the surface of a metal plate is sufficiently polished to be used for engraving, the slightest scratch upon it will print as a black line, the degree of blackness being proportioned to the depth of the scratch. ”

“ In the complete styles of engraving, stipple, line, and mezzotint, although American engravers are little known out of their own country—a large enough328 field, however, in which to exercise their talents—some good work has also been done ”

“ Marsh is one of the older men, and deserves the credit of first showing what wood-engraving is capable of in refinement of line; but younger men have joined him in developing these capacities of the art, and have made work in this style more common. The best of it is by Mr. F. S. King, being equal in every quality to Mr. Marsh's most admirable cuts. Such engraving is exceptional, of course; but the evenness and transition of tone, the care for line, the discrimination of both line and color values, shown in these butterflies (Fig. 77) , are characteristic of Mr. ”

“ Roughly speaking, the operation of engraving is performed by three different methods, viz. (1) By hand with a graver which cuts the metal away; (2) by etching, in which the pattern is dissolved out in nitric acid; and (3) by machine, in which the pattern is simply indented.
(1) Engraving by hand is the oldest and most obvious method of engraving, but is the least used at the present time on account of its slowness. The design is transferred to the roller from an oil colour tracing and then merely cut out with a steel graver, prismatic in section, and sharpened to a bevelled point. ”

“ The engraver has incised his outlines upon the plate—probably unbeaten copper or some even softer metal—and for his shading has employed a system of delicate strokes, laid close to one another and overlaid with two, and, at times, three, sets of cross-hatching. Such engravings, when printed, as is usually the case, in a greenish or grayish ink, give a result similar to a [Pg 60] wash drawing. In the Broad Manner the style of engraving is based upon that of pen drawing, with open, diagonal shade strokes and without cross-hatching. ”

“ Armorers and goldsmiths practiced this art of engraving in mediæval and Renaissance times. For our present purposes the absorbing question is this: How did the idea of printing from this decorated metal first suggest itself? We may get a clue by watching the engraver at work. With the graver he cuts a maze of lines into the metal; it is almost impossible to see the design owing to the glitter of each new-cut furrow. This troubles the engraver himself, and in36 order to see just what he has done, he smears the plate over with a mixture of lamp-black and oil, rubbing it well into the furrows. ”

“ Mezzotint engraving has, in this respect, the175 advantage of other processes; in all others it is decidedly inferior. The rough grain produced on a plate by the rocker, and the mere scraping by which it is obliterated or modified, are technical hindrances to decided drawing: only with graver or point is it possible to make outlines of perfect accuracy. Again, precision, delicacy of modelling, and perfect finish in detail are impossible to the scraper. ”

“ But the fact that this and the following lecture are on the subject of design in engraving, implies of course that in the work we have to examine, it was often the engraver himself who designed, and as often the artist who engraved.
And you will observe that the only engravings which bear imperishable value are, indeed, in this kind. It is true that, in wood-cutting, both Dürer and Holbein, as in our own days Leech and Tenniel, have workmen under them who can do all they want. But in metal cutting it is not so. ”