October 2, 1941
A permanent exhibition demonstrating the producing of prints made by hand processes opens in the Mezzanine Gallery of the Brooklyn Museum on Thursday, October 2, arranged by the Museum’s Department of Prints. The processes represented are: wood and steel engraving, woodcuts and wood blocks, etching methods, lithography and silk screen, as well as examples of the different kinds of papers used in making prints. A selection of prints in each category is shown along with typical tools and in some cases models of presses.
The pivotal section will be a group of pencil, crayon, and pen and ink drawings which exemplify the first step, in making a print. This will include Egyptian examples on papyrus and the reed pens and brushes that were used to produce them. Other drawings shown are by Rossetti, Albert Sterner, Daumier, Diego Rivera and Max H. Pechstein.
Wood engravings are explained by work of Timothy CoIe and Rockwell Kent done for the power press. The exhibits include the original block for Kent’s “The Diver.” Various steps are shown by means of an unused block, a block with a drawing on it but uncut, and a block ready for the press with the resultant print, “The Duchess of Devonshire” by Cole that was published in the Century Magazine.
Engraving on metal, which includes steel and copper engravings, mezzotints and stipple and line prints are demonstrated by nine prints and a gravure, a roulette, and an ink roller or dabber.
Eight woodcuts are shown in that section, black-and-white work, colored, black-and-white and straight color, accompanied by a set of wood-carving tools.
The Oriental phase of woodblocks, Japanese work, is demonstrated by chisels and knives, brushes of various sizes, and a set of seven blocks ready for printing with the color applied. Actual prints exhibited are a good example of “Two Crows” by Kawanabe Kyosai and two versions of Hiroshige’s “Ommayagashi, Sumida River.” One is a good impression and the other an inferior one done with less care, possibly by a second printer after the first set was made. By this process hand-made prints are produced in Japan in large quantities from the same set of blocks.
The etching section covers the bitten acid processes known as line, aquatint and soft ground. To explain the method of making them, a little model of an etching press is employed, complete with blanket for the plate to rest on, a small etched plate ready for printing, and paper as well as the needles, burin and dabber used to make a drawing and apply the ink on the plate.
The three kinds of plates are also shown in sample form with simple sketches on them to show the character of the line. One is an etching plate waxed and smoked, with the bright copper line made by the drawing needle scratching through the black surface; another, a copper plate prepared to produce an aquatint, with powdered resin shaken on and heated so as to make a transparent protecting surface through which lines can be scratched; and a soft ground plate that gives a soft pencil line by drawing on tracing paper laid on the plate so that the pressure of the pencil withdraws the soft surface ground onto the paper leaving a rough line of exposed copper. All these plates can be put into an acid bath which acts on the exposed copper lines and forms a furrow that will hold ink. Actual prints are shown exemplifying these methods done by Rembrandt, Van Amstel, Piranesi, R. Stanley Wilson and Julius Gayler.
Lithography is demonstrated by a model press with a miniature stone on it and a print from it, grease crayon and ink roller. There is also the actual stone with drawing on it, and the resulting print, of Diego Riverats “Zapata.” Five process proofs show the method of producing a lithograph in color, in this case Russell Limbach’s “Clown,” and on one sheet Albert Carmen has demonstrated the different crayon techniques.
To explain the silk screen process a set of progressive proofs of Hyman Warsager’s “Choir Boy” is exhibited, as well as a printing frame and a squeegee, the latter the tool that pushes the color through the silk. Two prints by Anthony Velonis and one by Leonard Pytlak round out this section.
One case is devoted to demonstrating the differences between wove and laid paper and water marks used for prints and drawing. The specimens are shown with light behind them to make their characteristics clear.
Brooklyn Museum Archives. Records of the Department of Public Information. Press releases, 1939 - 1941. 08-09/1941, 185-7. View Original
October 2, 1941
The first special showing of prints from the Brooklyn Museum’s Print Department, opening October 2, is a selection of fifty examples arranged as an exhibition entitled, “Portraiture in Modern Prints.” It ends November 23.
American, English, French, Italian and German artists are represented, including the work of five of the German artists classed by the Nazi regime as “degenerate.”
(NOTE: The catalogue is attached)
Artist; Title; [Medium]
Max Beckman; Portrait of a Woman; Lithograph
Max Beckman; Self Portrait (4); Drypoint
Max Beckman; The Widow; Drypoint
Max Beckman; Old Woman with Peaked Bonnet; Drypoint
Max Beckman; Self Portrait, 1919; Drypoint
Gerald L. Brockhurst; An Old Corsican; Etching
Mary Cassatt; Young Girl with Bonnet; Lithograph
Mary Cassatt; Profiles; Drypoint
Giorgio De Chirico; Hebdomeros; Lithograph
Andre Derain; Tete de Femme d’Cote; Etching
Andre Derain; Head of a Woman; Lithograph
Honore Daumier; Etienne Guilliamune; Lithograph
Rudolf Grossman; Head of a Young Man; Drypoint
Rudolf Grossman; Portrait of Hans Purrmann; Drypoint
Rudolf Grossman; Portrait of Olaf Gulbransson; Drypoint
Rudolf Grossman; Self Portrait; Drypoint
Foujita, Tsugouharu; Portrait of a Girl with Cat ; Lithograph
Erich Heckel; Head of Girl; Etching
Erich Heckel; Head of a Violinist; Woodcut
Edgar L. Holloway; Portrait of Paul Drury; Etching
Ernest L. Kirchner; Head of Doris; Lithograph
Kathe Kollwitz; Self Portrait; Lithograph
Kathe Kollwitz; Portrait of a Woman in Blue Blouse; Lithograph
Alexander Kruse; Young Smoker; Lithograph
Wihelm Von Lehmbruck; Head of a Woman; Drypoint
Henri Matisse; Arabasque; Lithograph
Henri Matisse; Portrait of Edgar Allan Poe; Etching
Henri Matisse; Portrait of Baudelaire; Etching
Joseph Margulies; Old Clothes Peddler; Lithograph
Edouard Manet; Le Gamin; Etching
Ludwig Meidner; Head of an Old Woman; Drypoint
Adolf von Menzel; Portrait of Moliere; Lithograph
Constantin-Emil Meunier; Le Mineur; Lithograph
Edvard Munch; Old Woman and a Girl; Lithograph
Luc-Albert Moreau; Rimbaud; Lithograph
Max Herman Pechstein; Head of a Man; Woodcut
Max Herman Pechstein; Woman Seated at Window; Drypoint
Augustus Peck; Girl with Red Hat; Monotype
Pablo Picasso; Head; Woodcut
Auguste Renoir; Pierre Renoir; Lithograph
Christian Rohlfs; Head of a Woman; Lithograph
Auguste Rodin; Victor Hugo; Drypoint
Georges Rouault; Gustave Moreau; Lithograph
Georges Rouault; Self Portrait; Lithograph
Karl Schmidt-Rottluff; Self Portrait, 1916 (2); Woodcut
Andre Segonzac; La Treille Muscate de Collette; Etching
Jono Simkovics; Self Portrait; Etching
Toulouse-Lautrec; Mlle. Marcel Lender; Lithograph
Anders Zorn; August Strindberg; Etching
Brooklyn Museum Archives. Records of the Department of Public Information. Press releases, 1939 - 1941. 08-09/1941, 188-90. View Original
October 2, 1941
The first special showing of prints from the Brooklyn Museum’s Print Department this season will be a selection of fifty examples arranged as an exhibition entitled, “Portraiture in Modern Prints.” American, English, French, Italian and German artists will be represented, including work of five of the German artists classed by the Nazi regime as “degenerate”. The dates are October 2 through November 23.
(NOTE: The above is an advance announcement. Slightly fuller details will be included in a subsequent release, which will announce the installation of a permanent exhibit of print techniques which will show in detail, including tools, how the various kinds of prints are produced. This will open also on October 2.)
Brooklyn Museum Archives. Records of the Department of Public Information. Press releases, 1939 - 1941. 08-09/1941, 184. View Original
