Setting Up Shop.
For the gun engraver, the workplace consists of two environments:
1) the natural environment of the wild animals and foliage the engraver depicts
2) the studio or shop within 4 enclosed walls
1) The Natural Environment
After nearly 20 years in the same location in Mexico NY, I relocated my shop to near-by Oswego, NY. in 2007. I have always liked this small city as it reminds me of a resort town without the inflated expenses of living near a large body of water (in this case, Lake Ontario). Copying the art work of others is not ethical. If an engraver is not a hunter, or at least an astute observer of wild animals, why would he be a gun engraver? Some European engravers I have met are not hunters, don't particularly enjoy the woods, and are clueless as to how game reacts in the woods. I fail to understand why such engravers waste their time engraving guns. Engraving an animal copied from a book or stolen artwork is wrong. If a customer insists on engraving an animal from a copyrighted photo or drawing, the engraver should advise him of copyright law and at the very least, use his own drawings to substantially change the animal so that it is the engraver's own work.Drawing and engraving animals in a zoo will not produce a credible game scene. Animals in zoos do not have the same behavior as animals in the wild. My personal experience 20 years ago, of observing captured bears doing circus tricks for treats at the Thompson Park Zoo in Watertown NY is but one extreme example. Relate yourself to wild animals. If you were taken as a small child and locked up in solitary confinement or locked up with others of your species who were insane (as zoo animals are), would your behavior be normal? Except to confirm physical details such as musculature or antlers, do not draw farm- like zoo animals.This engraver's opportunities to observe wildlife first hand are immense due to the major migratory flyway near Oswego.The Montezuma National Wildlife Refugeand warmer conditions heading south towards Ithaca NY offer many different opportunities for observing and drawing animals than the Adirondack Park. Cold can be a killer, and at age 56 the bitter Northern Winters and the occasional 12 TO 23 feet of snow will not be missed by this artist.I am advocating the notion that if an engraver wants to draw and engrave wildlife, he should visit where they live.
The gun engraver spends more time engraving foliage than he engraves animals. As the engraver observes animals, he can also observe foliage and how the lay of the land, time of day and food souses are determinant factors as to where animals are.The engraver's scroll is simply ornate foliage. As engravers, we are trying to make foliage more beautiful than it really is. New design ideas can evolve from walks in the woods and canoeing along rivers, ponds, and lakes.Scroll should be growing and flowing (just as in real life) and not stopping and traveling in weird directions. For example, scroll does not originate from a flower! Scroll has flowers towards it's termination; never from it's origin.
2) The Studio
Unlike the natural environment, we control the four man made walls that we call our studio or shop.
Factors that make a good engraver's studio:
Lighting Natural light is the best light for avoiding eye strain. Light over the left shoulder should be employed together with other supplementary light from every possible angle. Avoid fluorescent light as it causes eye strain.
Comfort A back on a chair is the best way to avoid lower back pain. Use the back as you are drawing scroll on the steel or checking your work.
Space Cavernous spaces for the engraver is not necessary. if you are not sitting at the vise cutting steel, ask yourself "Why ?" .
Tools Use ergonomic tools that do not cramp the hand or cause spasms. Keep your wrist as straight a practicable to avoid tendinitis.
Efficiency Employ a potter's wheel vise it will save you time and money.
Compliance with regulations
Air quality
Safety
Flooring
Chemical hazards
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
Pattern Designing
Selected Writings Of William Morris Abbreviated and Annotated
as Applicable to the Art of theTraditional Hand Engraving of Guns CONTINUED
By the word pattern-design, of which I have undertaken to speak to you to-night, I mean the ornamentation of a surface by work that is not imitative or historical... for the sake of beauty and richness, and not for the sake of imitation, or to tell a fact directly; so that people have called this art ornamental art, though indeed all real art is ornamental.
For I suppose the best art to be the pictured representation of men's imaginings; what they have thought has happened to the world before their time, or what they deem they have seen with the eyes of the body or the soul: and the imaginings thus represented are always beautiful indeed, but oftenest stirring to men's passions and aspirations, and not seldom sorrowful or even terrible.
Stories that tell of men's aspirations for more than material life can give them, their struggles for the future welfare of their race, their unselfish love, their unrequited service: things like this are the subjects for the best art; in such subjects there is hope surely, yet the aspect of them is likely to be sorrowful enough: defeat the seed of victory, and death the seed of life, will be shown on the face of most of them.
This is the best art; and who can deny that it is good for us all that it should be at hand to stir our emotions: yet its very greatness makes it a thing to be handled carefully...I say, with ornament that reminds us of these things, and sets our minds and memories at work easily creating them; because scientific representation of them would again involve us in the problems of hard fact and the troubles of life, and so once more destroy our rest for us. If this lesser art will really be enough to content us, it is a good thing; for as to the higher art there never can be very much of it going on, since but few people can be found to do it; also few can find money enough to possess themselves of any portion of it, and, if they could, it would be a piece of preposterous selfishness to shut it up from other people's eyes; while of the secondary art there ought to be abundance for all men, so much that you need but call in the neighbours, and not all the world, to see your pretty new wall when it is finished.
Of course you understand that it is impossible to imitate nature literally; the utmost realism of the most realistic painter falls a long way short of that; and as to the work which must be done by ordinary men not unskilled or dull to beauty, the attempt to attain to realism would be sure to result in obscuring their intelligence, and in starving you of all the beauty which you desire in your hearts...
You may be sure that any decoration is futile, and has fallen into at least the first stage of degradation, when it does not remind you of something beyond itself, of something of which it is but a visible symbol. Now, to sum up, what we want to clothe our walls with is (1) something that it is possible for us to get; (2) something that is beautiful; (3) something which will not drive us either into unrest or into callousness; (4) something which reminds us of life beyond itself, and which has the impress of human imagination strong on it; and (5) something which can be done by a great many people without too much difficulty and with pleasure. These conditions I believe to have been fulfilled by the pattern-designers in all times when art has been healthy, and to have been all more or less violated when art has been unhealthy and unreal. Ornamental pattern-work, to be raised above the contempt of reasonable men, must possess three qualities: beauty, imagination, and order. You will be drawing water with a sieve with a vengeance if you cannot manage to make ornamental work beautiful. As for the second quality, imagination: every work of man which has beauty in it must have some meaning in it also; that the presence of any beauty in a piece of handicraft implies that the mind of the man who made it was more or less excited at the time, was lifted somewhat above the commonplace; that he had something to communicate to his fellows which they did not know or feel before, and which they would never have known or felt if he had not been there to force them to it. I want you to think of this when you see, as, unfortunately, you are only too likely often to see, some lifeless imitation of a piece of bygone art, and are puzzled to know why it does not satisfy you. The reason is that the imitator has not entered into the soul of the dead artist; nay, has supposed that he had but a hand and no soul, and so has not known what he meant to do.Now as to the third of the essential qualities of our art: order. I have to say of it, that without it neither the beauty nor the imagination could be made visible.
These are limitations which are common to every form of the lesser arts; but, besides these, every material in which household goods are fashioned imposes certain special limitations within which the craftsman must work. Now, further, this working in materials, which is the raison d'être of all pattern-work, still further limits it in the direct imitation of nature, drives it still more decidedly to appeal to the imagination...Now, I have tried to point out to you that the nature of the craft of pattern-designing imposes certain limitations within which it has to work, and also that each branch of it has further limitations of its own.
...the subject of borders, which will apply somewhat to other kinds of wares. You may take it that there are two kinds of border: one that is merely a finish to a cloth, to keep it from looking frayed out, as it were, and which doesn't attract much notice. Such a border will not vary much from the colour of the cloth it bounds, and will have in its construction many of the elements of the construction of the filling-pattern; though it must be strongly marked enough to fix that filling in its place, so to say. The other kind of border is meant to draw the eye to it more or less, and is sometimes of more importance than the filling: so that it will be markedly different in colour, and as to pattern will rather help out that of the filling by opposing its lines than by running with them. Of these borders, the first, I think, is the fitter when you are using a broad border; the second does best for a narrow one. All borders should be made up of several members, even where they are narrow, or they will look bald and poor, and ruin the whole cloth. This is very important to remember. The turning the corner of a border is a difficult business, and will try your designing skill rudely; but I advise you to face it, and not to stop your border at the corner by a rosette or what not. As a rule, you should make it run on, whereby you will at least earn the praise of trying to do your best. As to the relative proportion of filling and border: if your filling be important in subject, and your cloth large, especially if it be long, your border is best to be narrow, but bright and sparkling, harder and sharper than the filling, but smaller in its members; if, on the contrary, the filling be broken in colour and small in subject, then have a wide border, important in subject, clear and well defined in drawing, but by no means hard in relief. Remember on this head, once more, that the bigger your cloth is the narrower in comparison should be your border; a wide border has a most curious tendency towards making the whole cloth look small.
as Applicable to the Art of theTraditional Hand Engraving of Guns CONTINUED
By the word pattern-design, of which I have undertaken to speak to you to-night, I mean the ornamentation of a surface by work that is not imitative or historical... for the sake of beauty and richness, and not for the sake of imitation, or to tell a fact directly; so that people have called this art ornamental art, though indeed all real art is ornamental.
For I suppose the best art to be the pictured representation of men's imaginings; what they have thought has happened to the world before their time, or what they deem they have seen with the eyes of the body or the soul: and the imaginings thus represented are always beautiful indeed, but oftenest stirring to men's passions and aspirations, and not seldom sorrowful or even terrible.
Stories that tell of men's aspirations for more than material life can give them, their struggles for the future welfare of their race, their unselfish love, their unrequited service: things like this are the subjects for the best art; in such subjects there is hope surely, yet the aspect of them is likely to be sorrowful enough: defeat the seed of victory, and death the seed of life, will be shown on the face of most of them.
This is the best art; and who can deny that it is good for us all that it should be at hand to stir our emotions: yet its very greatness makes it a thing to be handled carefully...I say, with ornament that reminds us of these things, and sets our minds and memories at work easily creating them; because scientific representation of them would again involve us in the problems of hard fact and the troubles of life, and so once more destroy our rest for us. If this lesser art will really be enough to content us, it is a good thing; for as to the higher art there never can be very much of it going on, since but few people can be found to do it; also few can find money enough to possess themselves of any portion of it, and, if they could, it would be a piece of preposterous selfishness to shut it up from other people's eyes; while of the secondary art there ought to be abundance for all men, so much that you need but call in the neighbours, and not all the world, to see your pretty new wall when it is finished.
Of course you understand that it is impossible to imitate nature literally; the utmost realism of the most realistic painter falls a long way short of that; and as to the work which must be done by ordinary men not unskilled or dull to beauty, the attempt to attain to realism would be sure to result in obscuring their intelligence, and in starving you of all the beauty which you desire in your hearts...
You may be sure that any decoration is futile, and has fallen into at least the first stage of degradation, when it does not remind you of something beyond itself, of something of which it is but a visible symbol. Now, to sum up, what we want to clothe our walls with is (1) something that it is possible for us to get; (2) something that is beautiful; (3) something which will not drive us either into unrest or into callousness; (4) something which reminds us of life beyond itself, and which has the impress of human imagination strong on it; and (5) something which can be done by a great many people without too much difficulty and with pleasure. These conditions I believe to have been fulfilled by the pattern-designers in all times when art has been healthy, and to have been all more or less violated when art has been unhealthy and unreal. Ornamental pattern-work, to be raised above the contempt of reasonable men, must possess three qualities: beauty, imagination, and order. You will be drawing water with a sieve with a vengeance if you cannot manage to make ornamental work beautiful. As for the second quality, imagination: every work of man which has beauty in it must have some meaning in it also; that the presence of any beauty in a piece of handicraft implies that the mind of the man who made it was more or less excited at the time, was lifted somewhat above the commonplace; that he had something to communicate to his fellows which they did not know or feel before, and which they would never have known or felt if he had not been there to force them to it. I want you to think of this when you see, as, unfortunately, you are only too likely often to see, some lifeless imitation of a piece of bygone art, and are puzzled to know why it does not satisfy you. The reason is that the imitator has not entered into the soul of the dead artist; nay, has supposed that he had but a hand and no soul, and so has not known what he meant to do.Now as to the third of the essential qualities of our art: order. I have to say of it, that without it neither the beauty nor the imagination could be made visible.
These are limitations which are common to every form of the lesser arts; but, besides these, every material in which household goods are fashioned imposes certain special limitations within which the craftsman must work. Now, further, this working in materials, which is the raison d'être of all pattern-work, still further limits it in the direct imitation of nature, drives it still more decidedly to appeal to the imagination...Now, I have tried to point out to you that the nature of the craft of pattern-designing imposes certain limitations within which it has to work, and also that each branch of it has further limitations of its own.
...the subject of borders, which will apply somewhat to other kinds of wares. You may take it that there are two kinds of border: one that is merely a finish to a cloth, to keep it from looking frayed out, as it were, and which doesn't attract much notice. Such a border will not vary much from the colour of the cloth it bounds, and will have in its construction many of the elements of the construction of the filling-pattern; though it must be strongly marked enough to fix that filling in its place, so to say. The other kind of border is meant to draw the eye to it more or less, and is sometimes of more importance than the filling: so that it will be markedly different in colour, and as to pattern will rather help out that of the filling by opposing its lines than by running with them. Of these borders, the first, I think, is the fitter when you are using a broad border; the second does best for a narrow one. All borders should be made up of several members, even where they are narrow, or they will look bald and poor, and ruin the whole cloth. This is very important to remember. The turning the corner of a border is a difficult business, and will try your designing skill rudely; but I advise you to face it, and not to stop your border at the corner by a rosette or what not. As a rule, you should make it run on, whereby you will at least earn the praise of trying to do your best. As to the relative proportion of filling and border: if your filling be important in subject, and your cloth large, especially if it be long, your border is best to be narrow, but bright and sparkling, harder and sharper than the filling, but smaller in its members; if, on the contrary, the filling be broken in colour and small in subject, then have a wide border, important in subject, clear and well defined in drawing, but by no means hard in relief. Remember on this head, once more, that the bigger your cloth is the narrower in comparison should be your border; a wide border has a most curious tendency towards making the whole cloth look small.
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
William Morris Ideals in Twenty First Century America as Applied to Gun Engraving.
This is an opinion about hand air impact tools for gun engraving coupled with a 20 power microscope. I believe that this is a relevant method. I do not believe that these alternative methods of true hand engraving with a hammer and chisel should be used for restoring the engraving on high quality firearms. I do not believe that these mechanical methods should try to emulate authentic hand engraving. The designers (engravers) for mechanical assist engraving should develop alternative styles suitable to the tools and magnification used.
About 15 years ago when taking an art course I was thumbing through a large hard bound book about a contemporary painter. I marveled at the incredible detail of this artist's scene of a beach with sunbathers. Later I found a photo of this same artist painting from a photograph of the beach scene. It stunned me to see that his canvas for the beach scene was about 20 feet long! The large book that I initially viewed the painting on was no more than eighteen inches long.
Anyone can achieve incredible detail when a 20 foot painting is reduced down to 18 inches.
The same concept holds true for the engraver using a microscope. A 20x power microscope will give detail beyond belief. Unfortunately these types of tools cannot produce or replicate hand work. This is why the best air impact tool engravers really use designs quite different than the old hand engravers.
My teacher Bob Maki told me of an engraver some years ago in Britain who used this new method of a power tool and a microscope. When his customers found him out his business was almost completely wiped out.. The power assist tools and microscope are not respected everywhere.
My European customers would never send me work if I used the air impact tool and a microscope. They view this American technique as amateurish.. but they are wrong. The air powered tools and the microscope make great engravings. But it is unfortunate that it is sometimes called hand engraving with out differentiating between true hand engraving and power assist engraving.
At a week long gun engraving seminar at Montgomery Community College the late Lynton McKenzie stated in class that "If I could only engrave by a power assist tool (brand name of power tool omitted by author) I will just give up engraving completely."
Over 100 years ago William Morris in his writing, The Aims of Art addressed the issue of hand held power tools:
"...the improved tool, which is auxiliary to the man, and only works as long as his hand is thinking; though I will remark, that even this elementary form of machine has to be dropped when we come to the higher and more intricate forms of art. Well, as to the machine proper used for art, when it gets to the stage above dealing with a necessary production that has accidentally some beauty about it, a reasonable man with a feeling for art will only use it when he is forced to. If he thinks he would like ornament, for instance, and knows that the machine cannot do it properly, and does not care to spend the time to do it properly, why should he do it at all? He will not diminish his leisure for the sake of making something he does not want unless some man or band of men force him to it; so he will either go without the ornament, or sacrifice some of his leisure to have it genuine. That will be a sign that he wants it very much, and that it will be worth his trouble: in which case, again, his labor on it will not be mere trouble, but will interest and please him... "
In my opinion, Morris's words should forever put to rest the notion that a machine held in the hand is a "hand engraver".
Morris's concerns, of which he vehemently complained, still live!
An unfortunate frustration to engravers is the British or European factory or dealer who attempts to debase a gun engravers' work in order to convince them that it is of less value than what others believe and that the engraver should charge less due to the sophistication of the "Continental"culture. Profit and retailing is more important to these "sophisticates" than respect and consideration.
Listening to customer feedback is incredibly important but sometimes comments are intentional to get a good price from the engraver. I have received comments from foreign customers such as "If it is not fast and low in cost, it is not good engraving.", Your work is better than we can get from Italy, too bad you are not Italian."
It's not only engravers who receive undesirable treatment. Europeans treat others the same way. The Germans, Brits, Italians, and Eastern Europeans all think that only they are the true masters of their art. All seem to ignore the French. Even French wine is being bested by others and French wine sales are reportedly falling in 2007.
What I mean to express, is that the problems of which William Morris wrote in the 1890's is still relevant in the 21st century. In modern terms I would state that that retail profit cannot be the only consideration when commissioning an engraving. Artistic and personal value of the owner of the art is also important. Does the the art improve your life by giving you happiness in some degree? How much is that worth?
It gladdens my heart that American individuals and firms although intimidated at times by the Europeans, respect the skilled laborer. William Morris would admire American attitudes in that we as a people believe in the Art of our work. In America, a hairdresser is an artist as well as the bricklayer. Americans also freely give their opinions whether they are educated or not in the subject at hand. In one's local library one might find titles such as the Art of Electronics, The Art of the Deal, Art of Happiness, The Art of Metal Clay Techniques for Creating Jewelry, The Art of Enameling, and on and on.
Americans are innovators. As a people we are proud of our work and do not hesitate to regard it as Art. I like to believe that William Morris would be satisfied these attitudes.
The finished work of America's plumbers, electricians, gunsmiths and all manner of tradesmen are epitomies of Morris' ideal of the craftsman as Artist, joyful in his work and proud of the end result. These tradesmen are often independent small businesses that are the very backbone of the American economy. We seem to lose freedoms each year in the United States but we, as tradesmen, artists and businessmen still have the right to work our arses off. In my simplistic analogy, this is why America is the dominant culture in the world. When the independent artists, businessman and tradesman no longer exists in America, it will be the end of our way of life.
Air tool engraving allows the mind to guide the chisel. In this sense the power assist engraver is creating art. Most designs cut with air impact tools are indicative to the air impact tool. This is a good thing, and Morris would approve. Air impact tool engraving coupled with a 20x microscope, far surpasses most other hand engravings in detail. It is wonderful, but it is a far a distance from true hand engraving and it is a misrepresentation to call it true hand engraving in my opinion.
If one is a remarkably talented artist, well schooled or self-taught in portraiture, landscapes, perspective, and of course graphic design excellent power assist engraving can be the result. If one is only fair or just very good,the air impact tool engraving is to authentic true hand engraving as a spray paint can is to a fine brush for oil painting.
For my own trade, I ask, as Morris did, that those who use machines to engrave do not use the same designs as the authentic hand engraver. My viewing of the best air impact tool engravers's work demonstrate that the detail achieved with a 20 power microscope commonly used by air impact tool engravers is truely wonderful. The men and women that use power tools to engrave do beautiful work, but it should be called mechanically assisted engraving, air tool engraving or electric engraving and not hand engraving.
In a final arguement for my opinion, I would state: "Hand work means no machine, period".
About 15 years ago when taking an art course I was thumbing through a large hard bound book about a contemporary painter. I marveled at the incredible detail of this artist's scene of a beach with sunbathers. Later I found a photo of this same artist painting from a photograph of the beach scene. It stunned me to see that his canvas for the beach scene was about 20 feet long! The large book that I initially viewed the painting on was no more than eighteen inches long.
Anyone can achieve incredible detail when a 20 foot painting is reduced down to 18 inches.
The same concept holds true for the engraver using a microscope. A 20x power microscope will give detail beyond belief. Unfortunately these types of tools cannot produce or replicate hand work. This is why the best air impact tool engravers really use designs quite different than the old hand engravers.
My teacher Bob Maki told me of an engraver some years ago in Britain who used this new method of a power tool and a microscope. When his customers found him out his business was almost completely wiped out.. The power assist tools and microscope are not respected everywhere.
My European customers would never send me work if I used the air impact tool and a microscope. They view this American technique as amateurish.. but they are wrong. The air powered tools and the microscope make great engravings. But it is unfortunate that it is sometimes called hand engraving with out differentiating between true hand engraving and power assist engraving.
At a week long gun engraving seminar at Montgomery Community College the late Lynton McKenzie stated in class that "If I could only engrave by a power assist tool (brand name of power tool omitted by author) I will just give up engraving completely."
Over 100 years ago William Morris in his writing, The Aims of Art addressed the issue of hand held power tools:
"...the improved tool, which is auxiliary to the man, and only works as long as his hand is thinking; though I will remark, that even this elementary form of machine has to be dropped when we come to the higher and more intricate forms of art. Well, as to the machine proper used for art, when it gets to the stage above dealing with a necessary production that has accidentally some beauty about it, a reasonable man with a feeling for art will only use it when he is forced to. If he thinks he would like ornament, for instance, and knows that the machine cannot do it properly, and does not care to spend the time to do it properly, why should he do it at all? He will not diminish his leisure for the sake of making something he does not want unless some man or band of men force him to it; so he will either go without the ornament, or sacrifice some of his leisure to have it genuine. That will be a sign that he wants it very much, and that it will be worth his trouble: in which case, again, his labor on it will not be mere trouble, but will interest and please him... "
In my opinion, Morris's words should forever put to rest the notion that a machine held in the hand is a "hand engraver".
Morris's concerns, of which he vehemently complained, still live!
An unfortunate frustration to engravers is the British or European factory or dealer who attempts to debase a gun engravers' work in order to convince them that it is of less value than what others believe and that the engraver should charge less due to the sophistication of the "Continental"culture. Profit and retailing is more important to these "sophisticates" than respect and consideration.
Listening to customer feedback is incredibly important but sometimes comments are intentional to get a good price from the engraver. I have received comments from foreign customers such as "If it is not fast and low in cost, it is not good engraving.", Your work is better than we can get from Italy, too bad you are not Italian."
It's not only engravers who receive undesirable treatment. Europeans treat others the same way. The Germans, Brits, Italians, and Eastern Europeans all think that only they are the true masters of their art. All seem to ignore the French. Even French wine is being bested by others and French wine sales are reportedly falling in 2007.
What I mean to express, is that the problems of which William Morris wrote in the 1890's is still relevant in the 21st century. In modern terms I would state that that retail profit cannot be the only consideration when commissioning an engraving. Artistic and personal value of the owner of the art is also important. Does the the art improve your life by giving you happiness in some degree? How much is that worth?
It gladdens my heart that American individuals and firms although intimidated at times by the Europeans, respect the skilled laborer. William Morris would admire American attitudes in that we as a people believe in the Art of our work. In America, a hairdresser is an artist as well as the bricklayer. Americans also freely give their opinions whether they are educated or not in the subject at hand. In one's local library one might find titles such as the Art of Electronics, The Art of the Deal, Art of Happiness, The Art of Metal Clay Techniques for Creating Jewelry, The Art of Enameling, and on and on.
Americans are innovators. As a people we are proud of our work and do not hesitate to regard it as Art. I like to believe that William Morris would be satisfied these attitudes.
The finished work of America's plumbers, electricians, gunsmiths and all manner of tradesmen are epitomies of Morris' ideal of the craftsman as Artist, joyful in his work and proud of the end result. These tradesmen are often independent small businesses that are the very backbone of the American economy. We seem to lose freedoms each year in the United States but we, as tradesmen, artists and businessmen still have the right to work our arses off. In my simplistic analogy, this is why America is the dominant culture in the world. When the independent artists, businessman and tradesman no longer exists in America, it will be the end of our way of life.
Air tool engraving allows the mind to guide the chisel. In this sense the power assist engraver is creating art. Most designs cut with air impact tools are indicative to the air impact tool. This is a good thing, and Morris would approve. Air impact tool engraving coupled with a 20x microscope, far surpasses most other hand engravings in detail. It is wonderful, but it is a far a distance from true hand engraving and it is a misrepresentation to call it true hand engraving in my opinion.
If one is a remarkably talented artist, well schooled or self-taught in portraiture, landscapes, perspective, and of course graphic design excellent power assist engraving can be the result. If one is only fair or just very good,the air impact tool engraving is to authentic true hand engraving as a spray paint can is to a fine brush for oil painting.
For my own trade, I ask, as Morris did, that those who use machines to engrave do not use the same designs as the authentic hand engraver. My viewing of the best air impact tool engravers's work demonstrate that the detail achieved with a 20 power microscope commonly used by air impact tool engravers is truely wonderful. The men and women that use power tools to engrave do beautiful work, but it should be called mechanically assisted engraving, air tool engraving or electric engraving and not hand engraving.
In a final arguement for my opinion, I would state: "Hand work means no machine, period".
Monday, March 16, 2009
The Decline Of The Artisan As An Artist
TECHNOLOGY AND THE DECLINE OF THE ARTISAN AS AN ARTIST Coursing through Oliver Goldsmith's (1730?–1774) poem, The Deserted Village (1770) one may view the loss of dignity and quality of life in a small village by the industrial revolution.Goldsmith used memories of his home town (Auburn, England) to give a sense of what is was like to live in a small village before the effect of the industrial revolution. Inhabitants of small rural villages moved to industrial centers during the industrial revolution. He wistfully remembers it's former inhabitants and the fulfilling life of skilled and gratifying know how the town's workers once had.. Goldsmith's memory of a happy and contented hometown is able to give a sense at what modernization did to the town and how it destroyed the way of life of the people who worked hard to keep a contented and productive life by working with skillful hands. I submit that many of us have lost the dignity and satisfaction of working with our hands.so that now the phrase "hand engraving" has been debased to mean picking up a hand held machine and trying to engrave and copy old hand engraved patterns with it. Why? Because the learning curve is so much shorter. The 18th and 19th centuries are still relevant for many of today's issues. Whereas men were adjusting to the fantastic changes of the industrial revolution. Today we are profiting in many ways yet still coping with the rigors of the industrial as well as the computerized information revolution.
Fortunately, the increases standard of living afforded by the computer revolution and globalization may enable better appreciation of the lost arts, art by skillful hands.
FULL TEXT
The Deserted Village (bold text for emphasis by Stephen Olin)
Sweet Auburn, loveliest village of the plain,Where health and plenty cheered the labouring swain,Where smiling spring its earliest visit paid,And parting summer's lingering blooms delayed:Dear lovely bowers of innocence and ease,Seats of my youth, when every sport could please,How often have I loitered o'er thy green,Where humble happiness endeared each scene;How often have I paused on every charm,The sheltered cot, the cultivated farm, 10The never-failing brook, the busy mill,The decent church that topped the neighbouring hill,The hawthorn bush, with seats beneath the shade,For talking age and whispering lovers made.How often have I blessed the coming day,When toil remitting lent its turn to play,And all the village train, from labour free,Led up their sports beneath the spreading tree,While many a pastime circled in the shade,The young contending as the old surveyed; 20And many a gambol frolicked o'er the ground,And sleights of art and feats of strength went round.And still as each repeated pleasure tired,Succeeding sports the mirthful band inspired;The dancing pair that sweetly sought renown,By holding out to tire each other down;The swain mistrustless of his smutted face,While secret laughter tittered round the place;The bashful virgin's sidelong looks of love,The matron's glance that would these looks reprove. 30These were thy charms, sweet village; sports like these,With sweet succession, taught even toil to please;These round thy bowers their cheerful influence shed,These were thy charmsÐbut all these charms are fled. Sweet smiling village, loveliest of the lawn,Thy sports are fled and all thy charms withdrawn;Amidst thy bowers the tyrant's hand is seen,And desolation saddens all thy green:One only master grasps the whole domain,And half a village stints thy smiling plain: 40No more thy glassy brook reflects the day,But, choked with sedges, works its weedy way.Along thy glades, a solitary guest,The hollow-sounding bittern guards its nest;Amidst thy desert walks the lapwing flies,And tires their echoes with unvaried cries.Sunk are thy bowers in shapeless ruin all,And the long grass o'ertops the mouldering wall;And trembling, shrinking from the spoiler's hand,Far, far away, thy children leave the land. 50 Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey,Where wealth accumulates and men decay:Princes and lords may flourish or may fade;A breath can make them, as a breath has made;But a bold peasantry, their country's pride,When once destroyed, can never be supplied. A time there was, ere England's griefs began,When every rood of ground maintained its man;For him light labour spread her wholesome store,Just gave what life required, but gave no more: 60His best companions, innocence and health;And his best riches, ignorance of wealth. But times are altered; trade's unfeeling trainUsurp the land and dispossess the swain;Along the lawn, where scattered hamlets rose,Unwieldy wealth and cumbrous pomp repose;And every want to opulence allied,And every pang that folly pays to pride.These gentle hours that plenty bade to bloom,Those calm desires that asked but little room, 70Those healthful sports that graced the peaceful scene,Lived in each look and brightened all the green;These far departing, seek a kinder shore,And rural mirth and manners are no more. Sweet Auburn! parent of the blissful hour,Thy glades forlorn confess the tyrant's power.Here as I take my solitary rounds,Amidst thy tangling walks and ruined grounds,And, many a year elapsed, returned to viewWhere once the cottage stood, the hawthorn grew, 80Remembrance wakes with all her busy train,Swells at my breast and turns the past to pain. In all my wanderings round this world of care,In all my griefsÐand God has given my shareÐI still had hopes my latest hours to crown,Amidst these humble bowers to lay me down;To husband out life's taper at the closeAnd keep the flame from wasting by repose.I still had hopes, for pride attends us still,Amidst the swains to show my book-learned skill, 90Around my fire an evening group to draw,And tell of all I felt and all I saw;And, as a hare, whom hounds and horns pursue,Pants to the place from whence at first she flew,I still had hopes, my long vexations past,Here to returnÐand die at home at last. O blest retirement, friend to life's decline,Retreats from care that never must be mine,How happy he who crowns in shades like theseA youth of labour with an age of ease; 100Who quits a world where strong temptations try,And, since 'tis hard to combat, learns to fly.For him no wretches, born to work and weep,Explore the mine or tempt the dangerous deep;No surly porter stands in guilty stateTo spurn imploring famine from the gate;But on he moves to meet his latter end,Angels around befriending virtue's friend;Bends to the grave with unperceived decay,While resignation gently slopes the way; 110And, all his prospects brightening to the last,His heaven commences ere the world be past! Sweet was the sound, when oft at evening's closeUp yonder hill the village murmur rose;There, as I passed with careless steps and slow,The mingling notes came softened from below ;The swain responsive as the milkmaid sung,The sober herd that lowed to meet her young;The noisy geese that gabbled o'er the pool,The playful children just let loose from school; 120The watchdog's voice that bayed the whispering wind,And the loud laugh that spoke the vacant mind;These all in sweet confusion sought the shade,And filled each pause the nightingale had made.But now the sounds of population fail,No cheerful murmurs fluctuate in the gale,No busy steps the grassgrown foot-way tread,For all the bloomy flush of life is fled.All but yon widowed, solitary thingThat feebly bends beside the plashy spring; 130She, wretched matron, forced, in age, for bread,To strip the brook with mantling cresses spread,To pick her wintry faggot from the thorn,To seek her nightly shed and weep till morn;She only left of all the harmless train,The sad historian of the pensive plain. Near yonder copse, where once the garden smiled,And still where many a garden flower grows wild;There, where a few torn shrubs the place disclose,The village preacher's modest mansion rose. 140A man he was to all the country dear,And passing rich with forty pounds a year;Remote from towns he ran his godly race,Nor e'er had changed, nor wished to change, his place;Unpractised he to fawn, or seek for power,By doctrines fashioned to the varying hour;Far other aims his heart had learned to prize,More skilled to raise the wretched than to rise.His house was known to all the vagrant train,He chid their wanderings, but relieved their pain; 150The long-remembered beggar was his guest,Whose beard descending swept his aged breast;The ruined spendthrift, now no longer proud,Claimed kindred there and had his claims allowed;The broken soldier, kindly bade to stay,Sat by his fire and talked the night away;Wept o'er his wounds of tales of sorrow done,Shouldered his crutch and showed how his fields were won.Pleased with his guests, the good man learned to glow,And quite forgot their vices in their woe; 160Careless their merits or their faults to scan,His pity gave ere charity began. Thus to relieve the wretched was his pride,And even his failings leaned to virtue's side;But in his duty prompt at every call,He watched and wept, he prayed and felt, for all.And, as a bird each fond endearment triesTo tempt its new-fledged offspring to the skies,He tried each art, reproved each dull delay,Allured to brighter worlds, and led the way. 170 Beside the bed where parting life was laid,And sorrow, guilt, and pain by turns dismayed,The reverend champion stood. At his control, Despair and anguish fled the struggling soul;Comfort came down the trembling wretch to raise,And his last faltering accents whispered praise. At church, with meek and unaffected grace,His looks adorned the venerable place;Truth from his lips prevailed the double sway,And fools, who came to scoff, remained to pray. 180The service past, around the pious man,With steady zeal each honest rustic ran;Even children followed with endearing wile,And plucked his gown, to share the good man's smile.His ready smile a parent's warmth expressed,Their welfare pleased him and their cares distressed;To them his heart, his love, his griefs were given,But all his serious thoughts had rest in heaven.As some tall cliff, that lifts its awful form,Swells from the vale and midway leaves the storm, 190Though round its breast the rolling clouds are spread, Eternal sunshine settles on its head. Beside yon straggling fence that skirts the way,With blossomed furze unprofitably gay,There, in his noisy mansion, skilled to rule,The village master taught his little school;A man severe he was and stern to view;I knew him well, and every truant knew;Well had the boding tremblers learned to traceThe day's disasters in his morning face; 200Full well they laughed, with counterfeited glee,At all his jokes, for many a joke had he;Full well the busy whisper, circling round,Conveyed the dismal tidings when he frowned;Yet he was kind, or, if severe in aught,The love he bore to learning was in fault;The village all declared how much he knew;'Twas certain he could write and cipher too;Lands he could measure, terms and tides presage,And even the story ran that he could gauge. 210In arguing too, the parson owned his skill,For even though vanquished, he could argue still;While words of learned length and thundering soundAmazed the gazing rustics ranged around,And still they gazed, and still the wonder grew,That one small head could carry all he knew. But past is all his fame. The very spot,Where many a time he triumphed, is forgot.Near yonder thorn, that lifts its head on high,Where once the signpost caught the passing eye, 220 Low lies that house where nutbrown draughts inspired,Where graybeard mirth and smiling toil retired,Where village statesmen talked with looks profound,And news much older than their ale went round.Imagination fondly stoops to traceThe parlour splendours of that festive place;The white-washed wall, the nicely sanded floor,The varnished clock that clicked behind the door;The chest contrived a double debt to pay,A bed by night, a chest of drawers by day; 230The pictures placed for ornament and use,The twelve good rules, the royal game of goose;The hearth, except when winter chilled the day,With aspen boughs and flowers and fennel gay;While broken teacups, wisely kept for show,Ranged o'er the chimney, glistened in a row. Vain, transitory splendours! Could not allReprieve the tottering mansion from its fall!Obscure it sinks, nor shall it more impartAn hour's importance to the poor man's heart; 240Thither no more the peasant shall repairTo sweet oblivion of his daily care;No more the farmer's news, the barber's tale,No more the woodman's ballad shall prevail;No more the smith his dusky brow shall clear,Relax his ponderous strength and lean to hear;The host himself no longer shall be foundCareful to see the mantling bliss go round;Nor the coy maid, half willing to be pressed,Shall kiss the cup to pass it to the rest. 250 Yes! let the rich deride, the proud disdain,These simple blessings of the lowly train;To me more dear, congenial to my heart,One native charm than all the gloss of art;Spontaneous joys, where nature has its play,The soul adopts and owns their firstborn sway;Lightly they frolic o'er the vacant mindUnenvied, unmolested, unconfined:But the long pomp, the midnight masquerade,With all the freaks of wanton wealth arrayed, 260In these, ere triflers half their wish obtain, The toiling pleasure sickens into pain;And, even while fashion's brightest arts decoyThe heart distrusting asks, if this be joy. Ye friends to truth, ye statesmen who surveyThe rich man's joys increase, the poor's decay,'Tis yours to judge how wide the limits standBetween a splendid and an happy land.Proud swells the tide with loads of freighted ore,And shouting Folly hails them from her shore; 270Hoards, even beyond the miser's wish, abound,And rich men flock from all the world around.Yet count our gains. This wealth is but a nameThat leaves with useful products still the same.Not so the loss. The man of wealth and prideTakes up a space that many poor supplied;Space for his lake, his park's extended bounds,Space for his horses, equipage, and hounds;The robe that wraps his limbs in silken slothHas robbed the neighbouring fields of half their growth; 280His seat, where solitary sports are seen,Indignant spurns the cottage from the green;Around the world each needful product flies,For all the luxuries the world supplies:While thus the land, adorned for pleasure all,In barren splendour feebly waits the fall. As some fair female unadorned and plain,Secure to please while youth confirms her reignSlights every borrowed charm that dress supplies,Nor shares with art the triumph of her eyes; 290But when those charms are passed, for charms are frail,When time advances and when lovers fail,She then shines forth, solicitous to bless,In all the glaring impotence of dress:Thus fares the land, by luxury betrayed,In nature's simplest charms at first arrayed;But verging to decline, its splendours rise,Its vistas strike, its palaces surprise;While scourged by famine from the smiling land,The mournful peasant leads his humble band; 300And while he sinks, without one arm to save,The country bloomsÐa garden and a grave. Where then, ah where, shall poverty reside,To 'scape the pressure of contiguous pride? If to some common's fenceless limits strayed,He drives his flock to pick the scanty blade,Those fenceless fields the sons of wealth divide,And even the bare-worn common is denied. If to the city spedÐwhat waits him there?To see profusion that he must not share; 310To see ten thousand baneful arts combinedTo pamper luxury and thin mankind;To see those joys the sons of pleasure knowExtorted from his fellow-creature's woe.Here, while the courtier glitters in brocade,There the pale artist plies the sickly trade;Here, while the proud their long-drawn pomps display,There the black gibbet glooms beside the way.The dome where Pleasure holds her midnight reignHere, richly decked, admits the gorgeous train; 320Tumultuous grandeur crowds the blazing square,The rattling chariots clash, the torches glare.Sure scenes like these no troubles e'er annoy!Sure these denote one universal joy!Are these thy serious thoughts?ÐAh, turn thine eyesWhere the poor, houseless, shivering female lies.She once, perhaps, in village plenty blessed,Has wept at tales of innocence distressed;Her modest looks the cottage might adorn,Sweet as the primrose peeps beneath the thorn; 330Now lost to all; her friends, her virtue fled,Near her betrayer's door she lays her head,And, pinched with cold and shrinking from the shower,With heavy heart deplores that luckless hour,When idly first, ambitious of the town,She left her wheel and robes of country brown. Do thine, sweet Auburn, thine, the loveliest train,Do thy fair tribes participate her pain?Even now, perhaps, by cold and hunger led,At proud men's doors they ask a little bread! 340 Ah, no. To distant climes, a dreary scene,Where half the convex world intrudes between,Through torrid tracts with fainting steps they go,Where wild Altama murmurs to their woe.Far different there from all that charmed beforeThe various terrors of that horrid shore :Those blazing suns that dart a downward ray,And fiercely shed intolerable day;Those matted woods where birds forget to sing,But silent bats in drowsy clusters cling; 350Those poisonous fields with rank luxuriance crowned,Where the dark scorpion gathers death around;Where at each step the stranger fears to wakeThe rattling terrors of the vengeful snake;Where crouching tigers wait their hapless prey,And savage men more murderous still than they;While oft in whirls the mad tornado flies,Mingling the ravaged landscape with the skies.Far different these from every former scene,The cooling brook, the grassy-vested green, 360The breezy covert of the warbling grove,That only sheltered thefts of harmless love. Good heaven! What sorrows gloomed that parting day,That called them from their native walks away;When the poor exiles, every pleasure past,Hung round their bowers and fondly looked their last,And took a long farewell, and wished in vainFor seats like these beyond the western main;And shuddering still to face the distant deep,Returned and wept, and still returned to weep. 370The good old sire the first prepared to goTo new-found worlds, and wept for others' woe;But for himself, in conscious virtue brave,He only wished for worlds beyond the grave.His lovely daughter, lovelier in her years,Silent went next, neglectful of her charms, And left a lover's for a father's arms.With louder plaints the mother spoke her woes,And blessed the cot where every pleasure rose; 380And kissed her thoughtless babes with many a tear,And clasped them close, in sorrow doubly dear;Whilst her fond husband strove to lend reliefIn all the silent manliness of grief. O luxury! thou cursed by heaven's decree,How ill exchanged are things like these for thee!How do thy potions with insidious joyDiffuse their pleasures only to destroy!Kingdoms, by thee to sickly greatness grown Boast of a florid vigour not their own. 390At every draught more large and large they grow,A bloated mass of rank unwieldy woe;Till sapped their strength and every part unsound,Down, down they sink and spread a ruin round. Even now the devastation has begun,And half the business of destruction done;Even now, methinks, as pondering here I stand,I see the rural virtues leave the land.Down where yon anchoring vessel spreads the sail,That idly waiting flaps with every gale, 400Downward they move, a melancholy band,Pass from the shore and darken all the strand.Contented toil and hospitable care,And kind connubial tenderness are there;And piety, with wishes placed above,And steady loyalty and faithful love.And thou, sweet Poetry, thou loveliest maidStill first to fly where sensual joys invade;Unfit, in these degenerate times of shame,To catch the heart or strike for honest fame; 410Dear charming nymph, neglected and decried,My shame in crowds, my solitary pride;Thou source of all my bliss and all my woe,That found'st me poor at first and keep'st me so;Thou guide by which the nobler arts excel,Thou nurse of every virtue, fare thee well!Farewell, and oh, where'er thy voice be tried,On Torno's cliffs or Pambamarca's side,Whether where equinoctial fervours glow,Or winter wraps the polar world in snow, 420Still let thy voice, prevailing over time,Redress the rigours of the inclement clime;Aid slighted truth; with thy persuasive strainTeach erring man to spurn the rage of gain;Teach him that states of native strength possessed,Though very poor, may still be very blest;That trade's proud empire hastes to swift decay,As ocean sweeps the laboured mole away;While self-dependent power can time defy,As rocks resist the billows and the sky. (1770)
Fortunately, the increases standard of living afforded by the computer revolution and globalization may enable better appreciation of the lost arts, art by skillful hands.
FULL TEXT
The Deserted Village (bold text for emphasis by Stephen Olin)
Sweet Auburn, loveliest village of the plain,Where health and plenty cheered the labouring swain,Where smiling spring its earliest visit paid,And parting summer's lingering blooms delayed:Dear lovely bowers of innocence and ease,Seats of my youth, when every sport could please,How often have I loitered o'er thy green,Where humble happiness endeared each scene;How often have I paused on every charm,The sheltered cot, the cultivated farm, 10The never-failing brook, the busy mill,The decent church that topped the neighbouring hill,The hawthorn bush, with seats beneath the shade,For talking age and whispering lovers made.How often have I blessed the coming day,When toil remitting lent its turn to play,And all the village train, from labour free,Led up their sports beneath the spreading tree,While many a pastime circled in the shade,The young contending as the old surveyed; 20And many a gambol frolicked o'er the ground,And sleights of art and feats of strength went round.And still as each repeated pleasure tired,Succeeding sports the mirthful band inspired;The dancing pair that sweetly sought renown,By holding out to tire each other down;The swain mistrustless of his smutted face,While secret laughter tittered round the place;The bashful virgin's sidelong looks of love,The matron's glance that would these looks reprove. 30These were thy charms, sweet village; sports like these,With sweet succession, taught even toil to please;These round thy bowers their cheerful influence shed,These were thy charmsÐbut all these charms are fled. Sweet smiling village, loveliest of the lawn,Thy sports are fled and all thy charms withdrawn;Amidst thy bowers the tyrant's hand is seen,And desolation saddens all thy green:One only master grasps the whole domain,And half a village stints thy smiling plain: 40No more thy glassy brook reflects the day,But, choked with sedges, works its weedy way.Along thy glades, a solitary guest,The hollow-sounding bittern guards its nest;Amidst thy desert walks the lapwing flies,And tires their echoes with unvaried cries.Sunk are thy bowers in shapeless ruin all,And the long grass o'ertops the mouldering wall;And trembling, shrinking from the spoiler's hand,Far, far away, thy children leave the land. 50 Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey,Where wealth accumulates and men decay:Princes and lords may flourish or may fade;A breath can make them, as a breath has made;But a bold peasantry, their country's pride,When once destroyed, can never be supplied. A time there was, ere England's griefs began,When every rood of ground maintained its man;For him light labour spread her wholesome store,Just gave what life required, but gave no more: 60His best companions, innocence and health;And his best riches, ignorance of wealth. But times are altered; trade's unfeeling trainUsurp the land and dispossess the swain;Along the lawn, where scattered hamlets rose,Unwieldy wealth and cumbrous pomp repose;And every want to opulence allied,And every pang that folly pays to pride.These gentle hours that plenty bade to bloom,Those calm desires that asked but little room, 70Those healthful sports that graced the peaceful scene,Lived in each look and brightened all the green;These far departing, seek a kinder shore,And rural mirth and manners are no more. Sweet Auburn! parent of the blissful hour,Thy glades forlorn confess the tyrant's power.Here as I take my solitary rounds,Amidst thy tangling walks and ruined grounds,And, many a year elapsed, returned to viewWhere once the cottage stood, the hawthorn grew, 80Remembrance wakes with all her busy train,Swells at my breast and turns the past to pain. In all my wanderings round this world of care,In all my griefsÐand God has given my shareÐI still had hopes my latest hours to crown,Amidst these humble bowers to lay me down;To husband out life's taper at the closeAnd keep the flame from wasting by repose.I still had hopes, for pride attends us still,Amidst the swains to show my book-learned skill, 90Around my fire an evening group to draw,And tell of all I felt and all I saw;And, as a hare, whom hounds and horns pursue,Pants to the place from whence at first she flew,I still had hopes, my long vexations past,Here to returnÐand die at home at last. O blest retirement, friend to life's decline,Retreats from care that never must be mine,How happy he who crowns in shades like theseA youth of labour with an age of ease; 100Who quits a world where strong temptations try,And, since 'tis hard to combat, learns to fly.For him no wretches, born to work and weep,Explore the mine or tempt the dangerous deep;No surly porter stands in guilty stateTo spurn imploring famine from the gate;But on he moves to meet his latter end,Angels around befriending virtue's friend;Bends to the grave with unperceived decay,While resignation gently slopes the way; 110And, all his prospects brightening to the last,His heaven commences ere the world be past! Sweet was the sound, when oft at evening's closeUp yonder hill the village murmur rose;There, as I passed with careless steps and slow,The mingling notes came softened from below ;The swain responsive as the milkmaid sung,The sober herd that lowed to meet her young;The noisy geese that gabbled o'er the pool,The playful children just let loose from school; 120The watchdog's voice that bayed the whispering wind,And the loud laugh that spoke the vacant mind;These all in sweet confusion sought the shade,And filled each pause the nightingale had made.But now the sounds of population fail,No cheerful murmurs fluctuate in the gale,No busy steps the grassgrown foot-way tread,For all the bloomy flush of life is fled.All but yon widowed, solitary thingThat feebly bends beside the plashy spring; 130She, wretched matron, forced, in age, for bread,To strip the brook with mantling cresses spread,To pick her wintry faggot from the thorn,To seek her nightly shed and weep till morn;She only left of all the harmless train,The sad historian of the pensive plain. Near yonder copse, where once the garden smiled,And still where many a garden flower grows wild;There, where a few torn shrubs the place disclose,The village preacher's modest mansion rose. 140A man he was to all the country dear,And passing rich with forty pounds a year;Remote from towns he ran his godly race,Nor e'er had changed, nor wished to change, his place;Unpractised he to fawn, or seek for power,By doctrines fashioned to the varying hour;Far other aims his heart had learned to prize,More skilled to raise the wretched than to rise.His house was known to all the vagrant train,He chid their wanderings, but relieved their pain; 150The long-remembered beggar was his guest,Whose beard descending swept his aged breast;The ruined spendthrift, now no longer proud,Claimed kindred there and had his claims allowed;The broken soldier, kindly bade to stay,Sat by his fire and talked the night away;Wept o'er his wounds of tales of sorrow done,Shouldered his crutch and showed how his fields were won.Pleased with his guests, the good man learned to glow,And quite forgot their vices in their woe; 160Careless their merits or their faults to scan,His pity gave ere charity began. Thus to relieve the wretched was his pride,And even his failings leaned to virtue's side;But in his duty prompt at every call,He watched and wept, he prayed and felt, for all.And, as a bird each fond endearment triesTo tempt its new-fledged offspring to the skies,He tried each art, reproved each dull delay,Allured to brighter worlds, and led the way. 170 Beside the bed where parting life was laid,And sorrow, guilt, and pain by turns dismayed,The reverend champion stood. At his control, Despair and anguish fled the struggling soul;Comfort came down the trembling wretch to raise,And his last faltering accents whispered praise. At church, with meek and unaffected grace,His looks adorned the venerable place;Truth from his lips prevailed the double sway,And fools, who came to scoff, remained to pray. 180The service past, around the pious man,With steady zeal each honest rustic ran;Even children followed with endearing wile,And plucked his gown, to share the good man's smile.His ready smile a parent's warmth expressed,Their welfare pleased him and their cares distressed;To them his heart, his love, his griefs were given,But all his serious thoughts had rest in heaven.As some tall cliff, that lifts its awful form,Swells from the vale and midway leaves the storm, 190Though round its breast the rolling clouds are spread, Eternal sunshine settles on its head. Beside yon straggling fence that skirts the way,With blossomed furze unprofitably gay,There, in his noisy mansion, skilled to rule,The village master taught his little school;A man severe he was and stern to view;I knew him well, and every truant knew;Well had the boding tremblers learned to traceThe day's disasters in his morning face; 200Full well they laughed, with counterfeited glee,At all his jokes, for many a joke had he;Full well the busy whisper, circling round,Conveyed the dismal tidings when he frowned;Yet he was kind, or, if severe in aught,The love he bore to learning was in fault;The village all declared how much he knew;'Twas certain he could write and cipher too;Lands he could measure, terms and tides presage,And even the story ran that he could gauge. 210In arguing too, the parson owned his skill,For even though vanquished, he could argue still;While words of learned length and thundering soundAmazed the gazing rustics ranged around,And still they gazed, and still the wonder grew,That one small head could carry all he knew. But past is all his fame. The very spot,Where many a time he triumphed, is forgot.Near yonder thorn, that lifts its head on high,Where once the signpost caught the passing eye, 220 Low lies that house where nutbrown draughts inspired,Where graybeard mirth and smiling toil retired,Where village statesmen talked with looks profound,And news much older than their ale went round.Imagination fondly stoops to traceThe parlour splendours of that festive place;The white-washed wall, the nicely sanded floor,The varnished clock that clicked behind the door;The chest contrived a double debt to pay,A bed by night, a chest of drawers by day; 230The pictures placed for ornament and use,The twelve good rules, the royal game of goose;The hearth, except when winter chilled the day,With aspen boughs and flowers and fennel gay;While broken teacups, wisely kept for show,Ranged o'er the chimney, glistened in a row. Vain, transitory splendours! Could not allReprieve the tottering mansion from its fall!Obscure it sinks, nor shall it more impartAn hour's importance to the poor man's heart; 240Thither no more the peasant shall repairTo sweet oblivion of his daily care;No more the farmer's news, the barber's tale,No more the woodman's ballad shall prevail;No more the smith his dusky brow shall clear,Relax his ponderous strength and lean to hear;The host himself no longer shall be foundCareful to see the mantling bliss go round;Nor the coy maid, half willing to be pressed,Shall kiss the cup to pass it to the rest. 250 Yes! let the rich deride, the proud disdain,These simple blessings of the lowly train;To me more dear, congenial to my heart,One native charm than all the gloss of art;Spontaneous joys, where nature has its play,The soul adopts and owns their firstborn sway;Lightly they frolic o'er the vacant mindUnenvied, unmolested, unconfined:But the long pomp, the midnight masquerade,With all the freaks of wanton wealth arrayed, 260In these, ere triflers half their wish obtain, The toiling pleasure sickens into pain;And, even while fashion's brightest arts decoyThe heart distrusting asks, if this be joy. Ye friends to truth, ye statesmen who surveyThe rich man's joys increase, the poor's decay,'Tis yours to judge how wide the limits standBetween a splendid and an happy land.Proud swells the tide with loads of freighted ore,And shouting Folly hails them from her shore; 270Hoards, even beyond the miser's wish, abound,And rich men flock from all the world around.Yet count our gains. This wealth is but a nameThat leaves with useful products still the same.Not so the loss. The man of wealth and prideTakes up a space that many poor supplied;Space for his lake, his park's extended bounds,Space for his horses, equipage, and hounds;The robe that wraps his limbs in silken slothHas robbed the neighbouring fields of half their growth; 280His seat, where solitary sports are seen,Indignant spurns the cottage from the green;Around the world each needful product flies,For all the luxuries the world supplies:While thus the land, adorned for pleasure all,In barren splendour feebly waits the fall. As some fair female unadorned and plain,Secure to please while youth confirms her reignSlights every borrowed charm that dress supplies,Nor shares with art the triumph of her eyes; 290But when those charms are passed, for charms are frail,When time advances and when lovers fail,She then shines forth, solicitous to bless,In all the glaring impotence of dress:Thus fares the land, by luxury betrayed,In nature's simplest charms at first arrayed;But verging to decline, its splendours rise,Its vistas strike, its palaces surprise;While scourged by famine from the smiling land,The mournful peasant leads his humble band; 300And while he sinks, without one arm to save,The country bloomsÐa garden and a grave. Where then, ah where, shall poverty reside,To 'scape the pressure of contiguous pride? If to some common's fenceless limits strayed,He drives his flock to pick the scanty blade,Those fenceless fields the sons of wealth divide,And even the bare-worn common is denied. If to the city spedÐwhat waits him there?To see profusion that he must not share; 310To see ten thousand baneful arts combinedTo pamper luxury and thin mankind;To see those joys the sons of pleasure knowExtorted from his fellow-creature's woe.Here, while the courtier glitters in brocade,There the pale artist plies the sickly trade;Here, while the proud their long-drawn pomps display,There the black gibbet glooms beside the way.The dome where Pleasure holds her midnight reignHere, richly decked, admits the gorgeous train; 320Tumultuous grandeur crowds the blazing square,The rattling chariots clash, the torches glare.Sure scenes like these no troubles e'er annoy!Sure these denote one universal joy!Are these thy serious thoughts?ÐAh, turn thine eyesWhere the poor, houseless, shivering female lies.She once, perhaps, in village plenty blessed,Has wept at tales of innocence distressed;Her modest looks the cottage might adorn,Sweet as the primrose peeps beneath the thorn; 330Now lost to all; her friends, her virtue fled,Near her betrayer's door she lays her head,And, pinched with cold and shrinking from the shower,With heavy heart deplores that luckless hour,When idly first, ambitious of the town,She left her wheel and robes of country brown. Do thine, sweet Auburn, thine, the loveliest train,Do thy fair tribes participate her pain?Even now, perhaps, by cold and hunger led,At proud men's doors they ask a little bread! 340 Ah, no. To distant climes, a dreary scene,Where half the convex world intrudes between,Through torrid tracts with fainting steps they go,Where wild Altama murmurs to their woe.Far different there from all that charmed beforeThe various terrors of that horrid shore :Those blazing suns that dart a downward ray,And fiercely shed intolerable day;Those matted woods where birds forget to sing,But silent bats in drowsy clusters cling; 350Those poisonous fields with rank luxuriance crowned,Where the dark scorpion gathers death around;Where at each step the stranger fears to wakeThe rattling terrors of the vengeful snake;Where crouching tigers wait their hapless prey,And savage men more murderous still than they;While oft in whirls the mad tornado flies,Mingling the ravaged landscape with the skies.Far different these from every former scene,The cooling brook, the grassy-vested green, 360The breezy covert of the warbling grove,That only sheltered thefts of harmless love. Good heaven! What sorrows gloomed that parting day,That called them from their native walks away;When the poor exiles, every pleasure past,Hung round their bowers and fondly looked their last,And took a long farewell, and wished in vainFor seats like these beyond the western main;And shuddering still to face the distant deep,Returned and wept, and still returned to weep. 370The good old sire the first prepared to goTo new-found worlds, and wept for others' woe;But for himself, in conscious virtue brave,He only wished for worlds beyond the grave.His lovely daughter, lovelier in her years,Silent went next, neglectful of her charms, And left a lover's for a father's arms.With louder plaints the mother spoke her woes,And blessed the cot where every pleasure rose; 380And kissed her thoughtless babes with many a tear,And clasped them close, in sorrow doubly dear;Whilst her fond husband strove to lend reliefIn all the silent manliness of grief. O luxury! thou cursed by heaven's decree,How ill exchanged are things like these for thee!How do thy potions with insidious joyDiffuse their pleasures only to destroy!Kingdoms, by thee to sickly greatness grown Boast of a florid vigour not their own. 390At every draught more large and large they grow,A bloated mass of rank unwieldy woe;Till sapped their strength and every part unsound,Down, down they sink and spread a ruin round. Even now the devastation has begun,And half the business of destruction done;Even now, methinks, as pondering here I stand,I see the rural virtues leave the land.Down where yon anchoring vessel spreads the sail,That idly waiting flaps with every gale, 400Downward they move, a melancholy band,Pass from the shore and darken all the strand.Contented toil and hospitable care,And kind connubial tenderness are there;And piety, with wishes placed above,And steady loyalty and faithful love.And thou, sweet Poetry, thou loveliest maidStill first to fly where sensual joys invade;Unfit, in these degenerate times of shame,To catch the heart or strike for honest fame; 410Dear charming nymph, neglected and decried,My shame in crowds, my solitary pride;Thou source of all my bliss and all my woe,That found'st me poor at first and keep'st me so;Thou guide by which the nobler arts excel,Thou nurse of every virtue, fare thee well!Farewell, and oh, where'er thy voice be tried,On Torno's cliffs or Pambamarca's side,Whether where equinoctial fervours glow,Or winter wraps the polar world in snow, 420Still let thy voice, prevailing over time,Redress the rigours of the inclement clime;Aid slighted truth; with thy persuasive strainTeach erring man to spurn the rage of gain;Teach him that states of native strength possessed,Though very poor, may still be very blest;That trade's proud empire hastes to swift decay,As ocean sweeps the laboured mole away;While self-dependent power can time defy,As rocks resist the billows and the sky. (1770)
OLIVER GOLDSMITH
Art and Labour
Selected Writings Of William Morris Abbreviated and Annotatedas Applicable to the Art of the Traditional Hand Engraving of Guns. by Stephen L. Olin, Gun Engraver.Selected quotes from Art and Labour Full text follows.
"...by art, I do not mean only pictures and sculpture, (Art is) beauty produced by the labour of man both mental and bodily... In other words the human pleasure of life is what I mean by art. Labour without which art could not exist: understand then that the labour I am thinking of is the labour that produces things, the labour of the classes called the working-classes...he had full control over his own material, tools, and time; in other words he was an artist. ...in the Middle Ages everything that man made was beautiful, just as everything that nature makes is always beautiful; and I must again impress upon you the fact that this was because they were made mainly for use, instead of mainly to be bought and sold as is now the case. The beauty of the handicrafts of the Middle Ages came from this, that the workman had control over his material, tools, and time. So much for popular art, that is of real art: there was a sort of gentleman's art left, done entirely by `artists' so-called and showing sometimes in the best of the pictures painted at the period a certain flippant cleverness as to invention and an amount of low manual dexterity in the execution which made the said pictures quite good enough for their purpose, the amusement namely of idle fine gentlemen and ladies. ......art is (not) a thing which can be produced by the conscious efforts of a few cultivated men apart from the work of the great mass of men." ( Ed.note read Leo Tolstoy's definition of art).
"...by art, I do not mean only pictures and sculpture, (Art is) beauty produced by the labour of man both mental and bodily... In other words the human pleasure of life is what I mean by art. Labour without which art could not exist: understand then that the labour I am thinking of is the labour that produces things, the labour of the classes called the working-classes...he had full control over his own material, tools, and time; in other words he was an artist. ...in the Middle Ages everything that man made was beautiful, just as everything that nature makes is always beautiful; and I must again impress upon you the fact that this was because they were made mainly for use, instead of mainly to be bought and sold as is now the case. The beauty of the handicrafts of the Middle Ages came from this, that the workman had control over his material, tools, and time. So much for popular art, that is of real art: there was a sort of gentleman's art left, done entirely by `artists' so-called and showing sometimes in the best of the pictures painted at the period a certain flippant cleverness as to invention and an amount of low manual dexterity in the execution which made the said pictures quite good enough for their purpose, the amusement namely of idle fine gentlemen and ladies. ......art is (not) a thing which can be produced by the conscious efforts of a few cultivated men apart from the work of the great mass of men." ( Ed.note read Leo Tolstoy's definition of art).
The Lesser Arts of Life
Selected Writings Of William Morris Abbreviated and Annotated
as Applicable to the Art of theTraditional Hand Engraving of Guns CONTINUEDSelected quotes from The Lesser Arts of Life by Stephen OlinFull text follows...the lesser arts, (ed. note, the "lesser" arts being pottery, furniture, weaving and etc.) when they are rejected, are so treated for no sufficient reason, and to the injury of the community; through them that I am the servant of the public, and earn my living with abundant pleasure. Then comes the question, What are to be considered the Lesser Arts of Life? The Greater Arts of Life, what are they? what I mean by an art is some creation of man which appeals to his emotions and his intellect by means of his senses. All the greater arts appeal directly to that intricate combination of intuitive perceptions, feelings, experience, and memory which is called imagination. All artists, who deal with those arts, have these qualities superabundantly, and have them balanced in such exquisite order that they can use them for purposes of creation. ...we have two kinds of art: one of them would exist even if men had no needs but such as are essentially spiritual, and only accidentally material or bodily. The other kind, called into existence by material needs, is bound no less to recognize the aspirations of the soul and receives the impress of its striving towards perfection. If the case be as I have represented it, even the lesser arts are well worthy the attention of reasonable men, and those who despise them must do so either out of ignorance as to what they really are, or because they themselves are in some way or other enemies of civilization, either outlaws from it or corrupters of it. if our houses, our clothes, our household furniture and utensils are not works of art, they are either wretched makeshifts or, what is worse, degrading shams of better things. Furthermore, if any of these things make any claim to be considered works of art, they must show obvious traces of the hand of man guided directly by his brain, without more interposition of machines than is absolutely necessary to the nature of the work done. I want an end of believing that we believe in art-bogies; I want the democracy of the arts established: I want every one to think for himself about them, and not to take things for granted from hearsay; every man to do what he thinks right, not in anarchical fashion, ...but feeling that he is responsible to his fellows for what he feels, thinks, and has determined. In these lesser arts every one should say: I have such or such an ornamental matter, not because I am told to like it, but because I like it myself, and I will have nothing that I don't like, nothing; and I can give you my reasons for rejecting this, and accepting that, and am ready to abide by them, and to take the consequences of my being right or wrong. Of course such independence must spring from knowledge, not from ignorance, and you may be sure that this kind of independence would be far from destroying the respect due to the higher intellects that busy themselves with the arts. On the contrary, it would make that respect the stronger, since those who had themselves got to think seriously about the arts would understand the better what difficulties beset the greatest men in their struggles to express what is in them. Anyhow, if this intelligent, sympathetic, and serious independence of thought about the arts does not become general among cultivated men (and all men ought to be cultivated), it is a matter of course that the practice of the arts must fall into the hands of a degraded and despised class...What other blessings are there in life save these two, fearless rest and hopeful work?
Full text
as Applicable to the Art of theTraditional Hand Engraving of Guns CONTINUEDSelected quotes from The Lesser Arts of Life by Stephen OlinFull text follows...the lesser arts, (ed. note, the "lesser" arts being pottery, furniture, weaving and etc.) when they are rejected, are so treated for no sufficient reason, and to the injury of the community; through them that I am the servant of the public, and earn my living with abundant pleasure. Then comes the question, What are to be considered the Lesser Arts of Life? The Greater Arts of Life, what are they? what I mean by an art is some creation of man which appeals to his emotions and his intellect by means of his senses. All the greater arts appeal directly to that intricate combination of intuitive perceptions, feelings, experience, and memory which is called imagination. All artists, who deal with those arts, have these qualities superabundantly, and have them balanced in such exquisite order that they can use them for purposes of creation. ...we have two kinds of art: one of them would exist even if men had no needs but such as are essentially spiritual, and only accidentally material or bodily. The other kind, called into existence by material needs, is bound no less to recognize the aspirations of the soul and receives the impress of its striving towards perfection. If the case be as I have represented it, even the lesser arts are well worthy the attention of reasonable men, and those who despise them must do so either out of ignorance as to what they really are, or because they themselves are in some way or other enemies of civilization, either outlaws from it or corrupters of it. if our houses, our clothes, our household furniture and utensils are not works of art, they are either wretched makeshifts or, what is worse, degrading shams of better things. Furthermore, if any of these things make any claim to be considered works of art, they must show obvious traces of the hand of man guided directly by his brain, without more interposition of machines than is absolutely necessary to the nature of the work done. I want an end of believing that we believe in art-bogies; I want the democracy of the arts established: I want every one to think for himself about them, and not to take things for granted from hearsay; every man to do what he thinks right, not in anarchical fashion, ...but feeling that he is responsible to his fellows for what he feels, thinks, and has determined. In these lesser arts every one should say: I have such or such an ornamental matter, not because I am told to like it, but because I like it myself, and I will have nothing that I don't like, nothing; and I can give you my reasons for rejecting this, and accepting that, and am ready to abide by them, and to take the consequences of my being right or wrong. Of course such independence must spring from knowledge, not from ignorance, and you may be sure that this kind of independence would be far from destroying the respect due to the higher intellects that busy themselves with the arts. On the contrary, it would make that respect the stronger, since those who had themselves got to think seriously about the arts would understand the better what difficulties beset the greatest men in their struggles to express what is in them. Anyhow, if this intelligent, sympathetic, and serious independence of thought about the arts does not become general among cultivated men (and all men ought to be cultivated), it is a matter of course that the practice of the arts must fall into the hands of a degraded and despised class...What other blessings are there in life save these two, fearless rest and hopeful work?
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The Aims of Art
Selected Writings Of William Morris Abbreviated and Annotatedas Applicable to the Art of theTraditional Hand Engraving of Guns CONTINUEDSelected quotes from The Aims of Art by Stephen OlinFull text followsIn considering the Aims of Art, that is, why men toilsomely cherish and practise Art ...I find that I can give it no other name than happiness. ...I find that while in the mood of idleness memory amuses me, in the mood of energy hope cheers me; which hope is sometimes big and serious, and sometimes trivial, but that without it there is no happy energy. ...nobody will be inclined to deny that the end proposed by a work of art is always to please the person whose senses are to be made conscious of it. It was done for some one who was to be made happier by it; his idle or restful mood was to be amused by it, so that the vacancy which is the besetting evil of that mood might give place to pleased contemplation, dreaming, or what you will; and by this means he would not so soon be driven into his workful or energetic mood: he would have more enjoyment, and better. The restraining of restlessness, therefore, is clearly one of the essential aims of art, and few things could add to the pleasure of life more than this. ...the Aim of Art is to increase the happiness of men, by giving them beauty and interest of incident to amuse their leisure, and prevent them wearying even of rest, and by giving them hope and bodily pleasure in their work; or, shortly, to make man's work happy and his rest fruitful. Consequently, art is an unmixed blessing to the race of man. Perhaps I can illustrate that by the detail of the application of machinery to the production of things in which artistic form of some sort is possible. Why does a reasonable man use a machine? Surely to save his labour. There are some things which a machine can do as well as a man's hand, plus a tool, can do them. He need not, for instance, grind his corn in a hand-quern; a little trickle of water, a wheel, and a few simple contrivances will do it all perfectly well, and leave him free to smoke his pipe and think, or to carve the handle of his knife. That, so far, is unmixed gain in the use of a machine - always, mind you, supposing equality of condition among men; no art is lost, leisure or time for more pleasurable work is gained. Perhaps a perfectly reasonable and free man would stop there in his dealings with machinery; but such reason and freedom are too much to expect, so let us follow our machine-inventor a step farther. He has to weave plain cloth, and finds doing so dullish on the one hand, and on the other that a power-loom will weave the cloth nearly as well as a hand-loom: so, in order to gain more leisure or time for more pleasurable work, he uses a power-loom, and foregoes the small advantage of the little extra art in the cloth. But so doing, as far as the art is concerned, he has not got a pure gain; he has made a bargain between art and labour, and got a makeshift as a consequence. I do not say that he may not be right in so doing, but that he has lost as well as gained. Now, this is as far as a man, who values art and is reasonable would go in the matter of machinery as long as he was free - that is, was not forced to work for another man's profit; so long as he was living in a society that had accepted equality of condition. Carry the machine used for art a step farther, and he becomes an unreasonable man, if he values art and is free. To avoid misunderstanding, I must say that I am thinking of the modern machine, which is as it were alive, and to which the man is auxiliary, and not of the old machine, the improved tool, which is auxiliary to the man, and only works as long as his hand is thinking; though I will remark, that even this elementary form of machine has to be dropped when we come to the higher and more intricate forms of art. Well, as to the machine proper used for art, when it gets to the stage above dealing with a necessary production that has accidentally some beauty about it, a reasonable man with a feeling for art will only use it when he is forced to. If he thinks he would like ornament, for instance, and knows that the machine cannot do it properly, and does not care to spend the time to do it properly, why should he do it at all? He will not diminish his leisure for the sake of making something he does not want unless some man or band of men force him to it; so he will either go without the ornament, or sacrifice some of his leisure to have it genuine. That will be a sign that he wants it very much, and that it will be worth his trouble: in which case, again, his labour on it will not be mere trouble, but will interest and please him by satisfying the needs of his mood of energy. He has long passed the stage at which machines are only used for doing work repulsive to an average man, or for doing what could be as well done by a machine as a man, and he instinctively expects a machine to be invented whenever any product of industry becomes sought after. He is the slave to machinery; the new machine must be invented, and when invented he must - I will not say use it, but be used by it, whether he likes it or not. But why is he the slave to machinery? Because he is the slave to the system for whose existence the invention of machinery was necessary. ...the aim of art was to destroy the curse of labour by making work the pleasurable satisfaction of our impulse towards energy, and giving to that energy hope of producing something worth its exercise. Now, therefore, I say, that since we cannot have art by striving after its mere superficial manifestation, since we can have nothing but its sham by so doing... I suppose that this is what is likely to happen: that machinery will go on developing, with the purpose of saving men labour, till the mass of the people attain real leisure enough to be able to appreciate the pleasure of life; till, in fact, they have attained such mastery over Nature that they no longer fear starvation as a penalty for not working more than enough. ...the true secret of happiness lies in the taking a genuine interest in all the details of daily life, in elevating them by art instead of handing the performance of them over to unregarded drudges...
Sunday, March 15, 2009
Selected Writings Of William Morris & Gun Engraving
Selected Writings Of William Morris Abbreviated and Annotated
as Applicable to the Art of theTraditional Hand Engraving of Guns
Selected quotes from Some Hints on Pattern Designing by Stephen OlinFull text follows
By the word pattern-design, of which I have undertaken to speak to you to-night, I mean the ornamentation of a surface by work that is not imitative or historical... for the sake of beauty and richness, and not for the sake of imitation, or to tell a fact directly; so that people have called this art ornamental art, though indeed all real art is ornamental.
For I suppose the best art to be the pictured representation of men's imaginings; what they have thought has happened to the world before their time, or what they deem they have seen with the eyes of the body or the soul: and the imaginings thus represented are always beautiful indeed, but oftenest stirring to men's passions and aspirations, and not seldom sorrowful or even terrible.
Stories that tell of men's aspirations for more than material life can give them, their struggles for the future welfare of their race, their unselfish love, their unrequited service: things like this are the subjects for the best art; in such subjects there is hope surely, yet the aspect of them is likely to be sorrowful enough: defeat the seed of victory, and death the seed of life, will be shown on the face of most of them.
This is the best art; and who can deny that it is good for us all that it should be at hand to stir our emotions: yet its very greatness makes it a thing to be handled carefully...I say, with ornament that reminds us of these things, and sets our minds and memories at work easily creating them; because scientific representation of them would again involve us in the problems of hard fact and the troubles of life, and so once more destroy our rest for us. If this lesser art will really be enough to content us, it is a good thing; for as to the higher art there never can be very much of it going on, since but few people can be found to do it; also few can find money enough to possess themselves of any portion of it, and, if they could, it would be a piece of preposterous selfishness to shut it up from other people's eyes; while of the secondary art there ought to be abundance for all men, so much that you need but call in the neighbours, and not all the world, to see your pretty new wall when it is finished.
Of course you understand that it is impossible to imitate nature literally; the utmost realism of the most realistic painter falls a long way short of that; and as to the work which must be done by ordinary men not unskilled or dull to beauty, the attempt to attain to realism would be sure to result in obscuring their intelligence, and in starving you of all the beauty which you desire in your hearts...
You may be sure that any decoration is futile, and has fallen into at least the first stage of degradation, when it does not remind you of something beyond itself, of something of which it is but a visible symbol. Now, to sum up, what we want to clothe our walls with is (1) something that it is possible for us to get; (2) something that is beautiful; (3) something which will not drive us either into unrest or into callousness; (4) something which reminds us of life beyond itself, and which has the impress of human imagination strong on it; and (5) something which can be done by a great many people without too much difficulty and with pleasure. These conditions I believe to have been fulfilled by the pattern-designers in all times when art has been healthy, and to have been all more or less violated when art has been unhealthy and unreal.Ornamental pattern-work, to be raised above the contempt of reasonable men, must possess three qualities: beauty, imagination, and order. ' You will be drawing water with a sieve with a vengeance if you cannot manage to make ornamental work beautiful. As for the second quality, imagination: every work of man which has beauty in it must have some meaning in it also; that the presence of any beauty in a piece of handicraft implies that the mind of the man who made it was more or less excited at the time, was lifted somewhat above the commonplace; that he had something to communicate to his fellows which they did not know or feel before, and which they would never have known or felt if he had not been there to force them to it. I want you to think of this when you see, as, unfortunately, you are only too likely often to see, some lifeless imitation of a piece of bygone art, and are puzzled to know why it does not satisfy you. The reason is that the imitator has not entered into the soul of the dead artist; nay, has supposed that he had but a hand and no soul, and so has not known what he meant to do.Now as to the third of the essential qualities of our art: order. I have to say of it, that without it neither the beauty nor the imagination could be made visible.
These are limitations which are common to every form of the lesser arts; but, besides these, every material in which household goods are fashioned imposes certain special limitations within which the craftsman must work.Now, further, this working in materials, which is the raison d'être of all pattern-work, still further limits it in the direct imitation of nature, drives it still more decidedly to appeal to the imagination...Now, I have tried to point out to you that the nature of the craft of pattern-designing imposes certain limitations within which it has to work, and also that each branch of it has further limitations of its own.
...the subject of borders, which will apply somewhat to other kinds of wares। You may take it that there are two kinds of border: one that is merely a finish to a cloth, to keep it from looking frayed out, as it were, and which doesn't attract much notice. Such a border will not vary much from the colour of the cloth it bounds, and will have in its construction many of the elements of the construction of the filling-pattern; though it must be strongly marked enough to fix that filling in its place, so to say. The other kind of border is meant to draw the eye to it more or less, and is sometimes of more importance than the filling: so that it will be markedly different in colour, and as to pattern will rather help out that of the filling by opposing its lines than by running with them. Of these borders, the first, I think, is the fitter when you are using a broad border; the second does best for a narrow one. All borders should be made up of several members, even where they are narrow, or they will look bald and poor, and ruin the whole cloth. This is very important to remember. The turning the corner of a border is a difficult business, and will try your designing skill rudely; but I advise you to face it, and not to stop your border at the corner by a rosette or what not. As a rule, you should make it run on, whereby you will at least earn the praise of trying to do your best. As to the relative proportion of filling and border: if your filling be important in subject, and your cloth large, especially if it be long, your border is best to be narrow, but bright and sparkling, harder and sharper than the filling, but smaller in its members; if, on the contrary, the filling be broken in colour and small in subject, then have a wide border, important in subject, clear and well defined in drawing, but by no means hard in relief. Remember on this head, once more, that the bigger your cloth is the narrower in comparison should be your border; a wide border has a most curious tendency towards making the whole cloth look small.
Full Text।
Some Hints on Pattern-Designing, William Morris
as Applicable to the Art of theTraditional Hand Engraving of Guns
Selected quotes from Some Hints on Pattern Designing by Stephen OlinFull text follows
By the word pattern-design, of which I have undertaken to speak to you to-night, I mean the ornamentation of a surface by work that is not imitative or historical... for the sake of beauty and richness, and not for the sake of imitation, or to tell a fact directly; so that people have called this art ornamental art, though indeed all real art is ornamental.
For I suppose the best art to be the pictured representation of men's imaginings; what they have thought has happened to the world before their time, or what they deem they have seen with the eyes of the body or the soul: and the imaginings thus represented are always beautiful indeed, but oftenest stirring to men's passions and aspirations, and not seldom sorrowful or even terrible.
Stories that tell of men's aspirations for more than material life can give them, their struggles for the future welfare of their race, their unselfish love, their unrequited service: things like this are the subjects for the best art; in such subjects there is hope surely, yet the aspect of them is likely to be sorrowful enough: defeat the seed of victory, and death the seed of life, will be shown on the face of most of them.
This is the best art; and who can deny that it is good for us all that it should be at hand to stir our emotions: yet its very greatness makes it a thing to be handled carefully...I say, with ornament that reminds us of these things, and sets our minds and memories at work easily creating them; because scientific representation of them would again involve us in the problems of hard fact and the troubles of life, and so once more destroy our rest for us. If this lesser art will really be enough to content us, it is a good thing; for as to the higher art there never can be very much of it going on, since but few people can be found to do it; also few can find money enough to possess themselves of any portion of it, and, if they could, it would be a piece of preposterous selfishness to shut it up from other people's eyes; while of the secondary art there ought to be abundance for all men, so much that you need but call in the neighbours, and not all the world, to see your pretty new wall when it is finished.
Of course you understand that it is impossible to imitate nature literally; the utmost realism of the most realistic painter falls a long way short of that; and as to the work which must be done by ordinary men not unskilled or dull to beauty, the attempt to attain to realism would be sure to result in obscuring their intelligence, and in starving you of all the beauty which you desire in your hearts...
You may be sure that any decoration is futile, and has fallen into at least the first stage of degradation, when it does not remind you of something beyond itself, of something of which it is but a visible symbol. Now, to sum up, what we want to clothe our walls with is (1) something that it is possible for us to get; (2) something that is beautiful; (3) something which will not drive us either into unrest or into callousness; (4) something which reminds us of life beyond itself, and which has the impress of human imagination strong on it; and (5) something which can be done by a great many people without too much difficulty and with pleasure. These conditions I believe to have been fulfilled by the pattern-designers in all times when art has been healthy, and to have been all more or less violated when art has been unhealthy and unreal.Ornamental pattern-work, to be raised above the contempt of reasonable men, must possess three qualities: beauty, imagination, and order. ' You will be drawing water with a sieve with a vengeance if you cannot manage to make ornamental work beautiful. As for the second quality, imagination: every work of man which has beauty in it must have some meaning in it also; that the presence of any beauty in a piece of handicraft implies that the mind of the man who made it was more or less excited at the time, was lifted somewhat above the commonplace; that he had something to communicate to his fellows which they did not know or feel before, and which they would never have known or felt if he had not been there to force them to it. I want you to think of this when you see, as, unfortunately, you are only too likely often to see, some lifeless imitation of a piece of bygone art, and are puzzled to know why it does not satisfy you. The reason is that the imitator has not entered into the soul of the dead artist; nay, has supposed that he had but a hand and no soul, and so has not known what he meant to do.Now as to the third of the essential qualities of our art: order. I have to say of it, that without it neither the beauty nor the imagination could be made visible.
These are limitations which are common to every form of the lesser arts; but, besides these, every material in which household goods are fashioned imposes certain special limitations within which the craftsman must work.Now, further, this working in materials, which is the raison d'être of all pattern-work, still further limits it in the direct imitation of nature, drives it still more decidedly to appeal to the imagination...Now, I have tried to point out to you that the nature of the craft of pattern-designing imposes certain limitations within which it has to work, and also that each branch of it has further limitations of its own.
...the subject of borders, which will apply somewhat to other kinds of wares। You may take it that there are two kinds of border: one that is merely a finish to a cloth, to keep it from looking frayed out, as it were, and which doesn't attract much notice. Such a border will not vary much from the colour of the cloth it bounds, and will have in its construction many of the elements of the construction of the filling-pattern; though it must be strongly marked enough to fix that filling in its place, so to say. The other kind of border is meant to draw the eye to it more or less, and is sometimes of more importance than the filling: so that it will be markedly different in colour, and as to pattern will rather help out that of the filling by opposing its lines than by running with them. Of these borders, the first, I think, is the fitter when you are using a broad border; the second does best for a narrow one. All borders should be made up of several members, even where they are narrow, or they will look bald and poor, and ruin the whole cloth. This is very important to remember. The turning the corner of a border is a difficult business, and will try your designing skill rudely; but I advise you to face it, and not to stop your border at the corner by a rosette or what not. As a rule, you should make it run on, whereby you will at least earn the praise of trying to do your best. As to the relative proportion of filling and border: if your filling be important in subject, and your cloth large, especially if it be long, your border is best to be narrow, but bright and sparkling, harder and sharper than the filling, but smaller in its members; if, on the contrary, the filling be broken in colour and small in subject, then have a wide border, important in subject, clear and well defined in drawing, but by no means hard in relief. Remember on this head, once more, that the bigger your cloth is the narrower in comparison should be your border; a wide border has a most curious tendency towards making the whole cloth look small.
Full Text।
Some Hints on Pattern-Designing, William Morris
Monday, March 9, 2009
Gun Engraving & The Arts and Crafts Movement
Photo was taken by the author at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It is European reinforcing armor plates that have been etched. Design ideas on weapons and armor such as this were taken from battlefields in the Middle east during the Crusades as war trophies. The European design displays an example of an early style of ornamentation (early 1500's) with Islamic influence.
Adding their own culture and design ideas the French with Louis the XIII encouragement perfected scroll designs. Pattern books were printed. These designs then influenced engravers throughout Europe।
William Morris lead the Arts and Crafts Movement and was a tremendous advocate of the craftsman as an artist। I was first introduced to William Morris and his significance to gun engraving as I was studying the pattern of a X grade Ansley Fox shotgun. The undulating leaves of this engraving pattern are in no doubt influenced by Morris and his beautiful acanthus borders.
Compare the gun engraving on the field grade Fox gun upgraded by the author to X grade engraving pattern to one of William Morris's tapestries।
Adding their own culture and design ideas the French with Louis the XIII encouragement perfected scroll designs. Pattern books were printed. These designs then influenced engravers throughout Europe।
William Morris lead the Arts and Crafts Movement and was a tremendous advocate of the craftsman as an artist। I was first introduced to William Morris and his significance to gun engraving as I was studying the pattern of a X grade Ansley Fox shotgun. The undulating leaves of this engraving pattern are in no doubt influenced by Morris and his beautiful acanthus borders.
Compare the gun engraving on the field grade Fox gun upgraded by the author to X grade engraving pattern to one of William Morris's tapestries।
The Hand Tool Powered by Human Muscle
"authentic" as defined from American Heritage Dictionary: Having a claimed and verifiable origin or authorship, not counterfeit or copied:...."by-hand" as defined from the audioenglish.net dictionary: Without the use of a machine.
"hand-made" as defined from yourdictionary.com :
made by hand, not by machine; made by a process requiring manual skills.
These writings do not in any way belittle gun engraving accomplished by mechanically assisted devices, photo-engraving deepened by a hand burin or chemical method. My purpose is simply to promote authentic hand engraving. The logic of true traditional hand engraving on guns will be explored as a practical method and as a movement.
Technology can expand creativity but it can also interfere with creativity by eliminating authenticity. Copying a gun engraving pattern that has been traditionally executed with a burin or a hammer and chisel for centuries is not authentic when a power engraving tool is employed.
I believe that if one is going to engrave with power tools one should not be copying the designs of authentic hand engravers. In fact, it is much easier to duplicate the cutting of an original design using the same tools and techniques of the original engraver. Those who wish to engrave with a powered mechanical assist in the hand instead of a hand tool should be developing their own designs fit for powered tools. The human body accomplishing art with dexterity and skill is a world away from art created by a power tool, or a computer program. When steel is cut employing sinew, muscle, learned dexterity, and clarity of technique, it lends a certain authenticity to the engraving that a machine, or chemicals cannot equal.
I am promoting the idea that technology should not be employed to copy gun engraving designs that have traditionally been engraved by hand. The hand tool powered by human muscle lends itself to certain design characteristics. I am asserting that power assisted engraving tools also have their own ideal designs. I strongly believe that true traditional hand engraving cannot be replaced by something else. For this reason the power assisted tools engravers need to develop their own designs and not attempt to copy the art of the true authentic hand engraver.
These writings do not in any way belittle gun engraving accomplished by mechanically assisted devices, photo-engraving deepened by a hand burin or chemical method. My purpose is simply to promote authentic hand engraving. The logic of true traditional hand engraving on guns will be explored as a practical method and as a movement.
Technology can expand creativity but it can also interfere with creativity by eliminating authenticity. Copying a gun engraving pattern that has been traditionally executed with a burin or a hammer and chisel for centuries is not authentic when a power engraving tool is employed.
I believe that if one is going to engrave with power tools one should not be copying the designs of authentic hand engravers. In fact, it is much easier to duplicate the cutting of an original design using the same tools and techniques of the original engraver. Those who wish to engrave with a powered mechanical assist in the hand instead of a hand tool should be developing their own designs fit for powered tools. The human body accomplishing art with dexterity and skill is a world away from art created by a power tool, or a computer program. When steel is cut employing sinew, muscle, learned dexterity, and clarity of technique, it lends a certain authenticity to the engraving that a machine, or chemicals cannot equal.
I am promoting the idea that technology should not be employed to copy gun engraving designs that have traditionally been engraved by hand. The hand tool powered by human muscle lends itself to certain design characteristics. I am asserting that power assisted engraving tools also have their own ideal designs. I strongly believe that true traditional hand engraving cannot be replaced by something else. For this reason the power assisted tools engravers need to develop their own designs and not attempt to copy the art of the true authentic hand engraver.
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