Where it all started (American illustration)

It is a bit surprising to me that we've gotten this far down the road without looking at Howard Pyle (1853-1911) yet. If I hadn't been knee deep in Willy Pogány books at the time, it very likely would have been Pyle we kicked things off with. There are two very good reasons.

The first is personal; my own fascination with Golden-age illustration began in the late 70's, at a yard sale in Rahway, New Jersey. A rather large Victorian household had rows and stacks of stuff all up and down its long driveway. Here I found incredible amounts of what I now believe to be press proofs, from the printing presses of Harpers magazines. I bought all I could afford at the time, which unfortunately wasn't much. (If I came across this sale nowadays, I can't imagine the financial stress it would cause me...) I beleive these were proofs because I now know the publications these images came from. The sheets these prints are on, while being either similar to press stock or tissue, are noticeably larger than the publications were....

This is where I first found Howard Pyle, and a number of his contemporaries, but Pyle's work captured my attention the most. The plate that really got me; is this one at the top right. This engraving so far surpassed other work I was familiar with... it had real emotion, character, storytelling, ATTITUDE. And that was all in one piece of black and white work. Check out the guys in the background, and their reaction to this yankee privateer—

Fast forward to 1984. After seeing the work I was producing, my second year painting teacher asks me to bring in some of what I think is good work. I bring him books of the hottest science fiction and fantasy book-jacket guys of the day. He asks if I 've ever heard of the Brandywine school, and sends me to the library. Thanks, Mr. Fritz.

The second (and far less personal) reason Pyle is so important, is; I do not believe there has been a single more influential artist than Pyle on American illustration. (listen for feathers ruffling) He was the biggest rock to go in the pond. Ripples? Practically immeasurable. During an immensely successful career, Howard Pyle decided it was his calling to teach his craft, not to numb masses filing through modern art schools, but to a select group, the best of the best, hand-picked by Pyle himself. He had a great eye for talent, apparently, because his first-generation students are among the tops in all of American illustration, during the first half of the 20th century. Cream of that crop? Frank Schoonover, Harvey Dunn, Stanley Arthurs, Elizabeth Shippen-Green, Jessie Wilcox Smith, Anton Otto Fisher, William James Aylward...whew. Pyle crossed brushes with a young upstart by the name of Maxfield Parrish—already taking on big jobs before he got to Pyle's school—Pyle told him he was already well on his way, and was in no need of his teachings. Oh, yeah, then there was that N. C. Wyeth fellow. Nice guy. And many of Pyle's students became teachers as well, spreading it on down. Ripples.

Any of these artists warrant a page of their own here on VIEW. Most have had a page or three elsewhere, hence the links. (Again, Jim Vadeboncouer has blazed the trail here) Most will get one. Pyle will get a few, for different aspects of his work; Wyeth and Parrish, yes, they are also a multi-page guys. More to follow on this soon-

Jeff

That's a Whole Lotta Bull . . .

. . .and that's a great thing. René Bull (1872-1942) is not an instantly recognizable name, even here among fans of illustration. Born in Dublin, Ireland, he had a fair career in the trade, with a good deal of time as a war correspondent, covering stories from 1896 up into WWI (including time in the mid-east and India). A generous portion of his work resides in periodicals of the day, and what was not war art, might have been early humorous cartoons. But IF you have come across his name, there is an excellent chance it is in association with this book—The Arabian Nights—

Bull did sizable jobs on a few books, including a nice Rubáiyat of Omar Khayyám in 1913, but it is hard to compare even that otherwise beautiful collection to his work in The Arabian Nights.

The better editions of Bull's The Arabian Nights (First editions being from 1912) contain 20 full color-tipped in plates, and 98 black and white pieces. Some full-page, some worked into the text, some done in an early halftone method . . . all of them top-notch. How he maintained such a high degree of quality on such a large amount of work astounds me. It is the book that his name will go on living for, and in my opinion, makes him one of the two best illustrators of these tales that I have had the pleasure of looking through. While his color work here is bright, well-balanced, and full of all of the life and details we want to imagine, the line work is out of this world. Rarely have I seen line look more fluid, more natural in its description, or more efficient in its ability to convey a form. Bull captures character, light, and climate in his amazing use of nothing other than black ink. Put this whole package together, it stands up to the very best books of the period.

Information on Bull is hard to come by. He went on to do Andersen's Fairy Tales and a Gulliver's Travels, also A book of The Russian Ballet, and an adaptation of Carmen, but they fall short of the brilliance he achieved with The Arabian Nights and to some extant, his Rubáiyat. Perhaps it was his personal interest in the east and his own experiences there that gave those projects their dynamic spark. Bull did work into the 1930's, though the work wasn't as plentiful, his name comes up on dust jacket art on numerous juvenile projects.

If you haven't come across him before, remember his name for this 1912 edition.

See you next week—Jeff

Visions of Camelot

Visions of Camelot: Great Illustrations of King Arthur and his Court

My relationship with Dover Publications goes back almost 11 years. Much longer if you look at the time their books have been influencing me. Dover prides itself in making available the hard-to-find, both in texts, and in images.

Having put together a handful of books for Dover— my favorites have been those connected by a central theme. The first like this was Poe: Illustrated. The idea and format were well enough received that we've been able to do a few more, the latest having hit Dover's site this week. This theme is a selection of Arthurian imagery.

Visions of Camelot, (now available here on Dover's site) is my fourth title with this approach. There are classic images you might expect, like a selection of Aubrey Beardsley's iconic line pieces from the 1894 Le Morte D'Arthur ; and a generous sampling of Howard Pyle's decorative ink style. Color works from such illustration giants as Walter Crane (one of his last books), Arthur Rackham, and N.C. Wyeth. In keeping with Dover's history, there are some rare gems as well—a nice group by British watercolor legend, Sir William Russell Flint, from early in his career, and seven pages of art-deco styled Arthur by Thomas Mackenzie. If Arthurian legend interests you, this collection of over 140 images gives you some of the best imagery created from 1893-1923, stylistically ranging from Victorian to Art-Deco.

From top to bottom on the right- The Crane plates are from 1911.They are less decorative, and more illustrative than his typical work, but they perform the task admirably. This plate, "Beaumins wins the fight at the ford," breaks from Crane's usual stoic poses, to throw the viewer full into the action.

Willy Pogany here is at his best- I love his work on Wagner's Ring Trilogy. 1911-1915. The plate from Parsifal places a classic grail knight at the throat of a dragon, complete with damsel and grail-shield. Note the tremendous restraint on Pogany's part—the image is two colors, only the thin halo around the knights head is printed in Brown-gold.

Howard Pyle's work (#3) got me into all of this. Like Gordon Grant, mentioned last week, (see below) Pyle uses ink to make lines that read as areas of values, an inking technique brought over from the days of preparing plates for engravers.

The last plate, is one of those scarce William Russell Flint pieces. Originally from a two-volume set, "She was a great huntress and daily she used to hunt, and ever she bare her bow with her." This piece has some great design qualities, and Flint's whole group reads to me as a powerful influence on the watercolor work of modern day master Alan Lee.

See you next week—Jeff

Gordon Grant, Down to the Sea in Ships

OK, lost my way for a bit there. As an illustrator and a freelancer, sometimes the workload gets busier than others. Busy, is generally a good thing. There does come a time when some form of sacrifice is made to make a deadline, and it has been that kind of time, so the V I E W took a little break. If I am lucky, it will happen again . . . but I'm back, and here is a bit of an intro to an illustrator who for most of his career worked in an area which greatly interests me— marine illustration. For all those who know my recent works, it is apparent that the sea has taken up a good amount of my attention as a painter/illustrator. This is one of the guys whose work inspires me—

Gordon Grant

Grant (1875-1962) was right in the thick of the Golden Age, being 25 in 1900. He found a specialized market and a personal strength in nautical subjects that gave him a path divergent from many of his contemporaries. There was a good deal of work with this theme at that time, both in fiction and in the reporting of the day; so much so, in fact, that there was more than one illustrator that made quite a good name for themselves even with this very narrow focus—W. J. Aylward and Anton Otto Fisher both come to mind immediately. Each of them may get a deeper look from VIEW down the road.

Grant's work has a very personal look to it, it often retains a lot of the freshness of a direct sketch. It's this drawing quality that separates him from most of the other marine illustrators out there at the time, and still to this day gives his work a first-person authenticity. In many of the publications he produced, a sketchbook style page is presented as the end product, with a certain degree of looseness, bold strokes, and solid inked-in shadows. As an inker, he is superb. His understanding of light and the limits of the ink line are woven in and out of each other to form some fantastic interpretations. Many years ago, I said to a friend that in a great ink drawing, the viewer no longer "sees" the line. ( I was describing Howard Pyle's work at the time) Grant's work does that, he paints values with ink lines.

The book that I found Gordon Grant in was The Book of Old Ships by Henry B. Culver. This book is in print today and is readily available. It contains no less than 80 line drawings by Grant, recording most of the major sailing-ship designs from Egyptian galleys to the Clipper. They are accurate, remarkably efficient ink drawings backed with good research; they make for great reference. Grants' book work with Culver would continue, from The Book of Old Ships in 1924, to Forty Famous Ships in 1936. This book has some of Grant's color work as well, which are for the most part finely colored drawings. Again, solid research, even with notes and specs on the ships in the appendix. Two other titles I own, that have the sketchbook approach, are 1932's Greasy Luck; A Whaling Sketchbook. This book tells a great tale in its images and notes, of an occupation no longer practiced. And last is the Gordon Grant Sketchbook. This little Watson-Guptill book is really a facsimile sketchbook, full of floating characters, side-turned compositions, and no text. Spontaneous, energetic studies.

Check out Jim Vadeboncoeur's bio of Grant here. (In connection with Bud Plant)

And here is work by a great modern-day maritime painter, (R. C. Moore) also inspired by Grant, who is the primary force behind the great ship work on a certain ship based card game-



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Next week I expect the release of my latest book with Dover Publications, Visions of Camelot, Great Illustrations of King Arthur and His Court. When the book is posted, I'll give a little sample of what's in it. The topic has been one I've wanted to compile for as long as I've been putting books like this together.

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Thanks to all those who have said hi, signed on, and like what they've seen. Keep the comments coming, it will help shape what we are looking at here. Jeff