Engraving: Its Origin, Processes, and HistoryDelaborde, Henri, comte
History
Engraving: Its Origin, Processes, and History
Delaborde, Henri, comte
Engravers -- Great Britain; Engraving -- Great Britain; Engraving -- History
Among other distinguished men who worked in line during this period
must be mentioned James Heath, Anker Smith, John Keyse Sherwin, Francis
Legat, Thomas Morris--a pupil of Woollett's--who engraved the fine
views of the Monument, seen from Fish Street Hill, and St. Paul's
Cathedral from Ludgate Hill, and lastly the unfortunate William Wynne
Ryland, who engraved the portraits of George III. and Lord Bute, which
Strange had refused to undertake, and who, though of greater eminence
in line, is credited with bringing into notice in England the stipple
manner of engraving. Ryland finally ended an adventurous career by
being hanged for forging two bills on the East India Company, and by
his death--notwithstanding all efforts to obtain a reprieve--justified
words used in relation to the event: "Popes and monarchs have pardoned
men who had committed crimes of the deepest dye--even murder--in
consideration of their talents as artists; but Ryland lived in England,
the land of trade and commerce, and had committed an offence against
the laws of money, the god of its idolatry." Nor during the history
of this period ought the names of Thomas Worlidge, David Deuchar, and
the ingenious Captain Baillie to be omitted; Worlidge in the early
part, and Deuchar at the close of the century, etched each in his own
style with precision and effect, while William Baillie, an Irishman and
retired cavalry officer (born 1723, died 1810), etched and worked in
mezzotint with equal happiness and success.
William Blake (born 1757), poet, engraver, and painter, stands alone.
In engraving--the laborious art by which he was content to live--he has
executed admirable works, apart from his own peculiar methods, both in
line, as shown in the portrait of Lavater, and in stipple, as in the
"Industrious Cottager," after Morland; as poet and painter he has left
songs and designs which, if soaring higher than men can follow, or even
his own powers of hand and mind sufficiently express, remain for ever
to arouse the wonder and excite the imagination of posterity. Though
he lived in poverty, and oppressed with cares, he was always cheerful
and beloved by all who knew him intimately; he was ever at work while
life lasted, and died in 1827, as he had lived, a righteous and happy
man. He was laid in Bunhill Fields burying-ground, but the spot where
he was buried is marked by no tombstone, nor can it now be actually
identified; but who that has looked at the portrait engraved by Jeens
from Linnell's wondrous miniature can ever forget the face of the poet,
engraver, and painter, William Blake?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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