John Baptist Jackson | Page 4

alphabet he engraved on end-grain wood for Dr. Fell in 1674. Further data on Edwards can be found in Harry Carter's Wolvercote Mill, Oxford, 1957, pp. 14, 15, 20, and in Moxon's Mechanick Exercises, or the Doctrine of Handy Works Applied to the Art of Printing. (Reprint of 1st ed., 1683, edited and annotated by Herbert Davis and Harry Carter, Oxford, 1958, p. 26n.)]
Jackson made, in fact, the biggest break in the traditions of the woodcut since the 16th century. He broadened the scope of the chiaroscuro print and launched the color woodcut as a distinct art form that rivaled the polychrome effects of painting while retaining a character of its own. These were not modest little pieces of purely technical interest. The set of 24 sheets reproducing 17 paintings by Venetian masters made up the most heroic single project in chiaroscuro, and the 6 large landscapes, completed in 1744, after gouache paintings by Marco Ricci, were the most impressive color woodcuts in the Western world between the 16th century and the last decade of the 19th.
But Jackson's grand ambition to advance the woodcut beyond all other graphic media had little public or private support and finally led him to ruin. His efforts were made with insufficient means and with few patrons. As a consequence, he rarely printed editions after the blocks were cut and proofed. The Venetian set is well known because it was printed in a substantial edition. A few additional subjects were also sponsored by patrons, but most of Jackson's other chiaroscuros were never published-- they were limited to a few proofs. Editions were postponed, no doubt, in the hope that a patron would come along to pay expenses in return for a formal dedication in Latin, but this did not often happen. Most subjects exist in a few copies only; of some, single impressions alone remain. Others have entirely disappeared.
With a large part of Jackson's work unknown, his reputation settled into an uneasy obscurity which, it must be granted, has not prevented his work from being collected. The chiaroscuros, especially the Venetian prints, can be found in many leading collections in Europe and the United States, but the full-color sheets after Ricci are excessively rare, particularly in complete sets.
Jackson has long been considered an interesting figure. His Essay on the Invention of Engraving and Printing in Chiaro Oscuro...,[3] with its bold claims to innovation and merit, his adventurous career as an English woodcutter in Europe, his adaptation of the color woodcut to wallpaper printing and his pioneering efforts in this field, and Papillon's immoderate attack on him in the important Traite historique et pratique de la gravure en bois[4] will be discussed later. For the moment we can say that the Essay was the first book by an Englishman with color plates since the Book of St. Albans of 1486, with its heraldic shields in three or four colors, and the first book with block-print plates in naturalistic colors.[5]
[Footnote 3: Jackson, London, 1754. Hereafter cited as Essay. Other references bearing directly on Jackson will receive only partial citation in the text. They are given in full in the bibliography, page 171.]
[Footnote 4: Papillon, Paris, 1766. Hereafter cited as the Traite.]
[Footnote 5: Occasional book illustrations in two or three colors, confined chiefly to initial letters and ornamental borders, appeared as early as the 15th century. Ratdolt in 1485 printed astronomical diagrams in red, orange, and black, and used similar colors in a Crucifixion in the Passau missal of 1494. The Liber selectarum cantionum of Senfel, 1520, however, has a frontispiece printed in a broad range of colors from more than four woodblocks. The design is attributed to Hans Weiditz.]
Although critics have been interested in Jackson as an historical figure, they have been uncertain about the merit of his work. Opinions vary surprisingly. Most judgments were based on the Venetian chiaroscuros and depended upon the quality of impressions, many of which are poor. Criticisms when they have been adverse have been surprisingly harsh. It is unusual, to say the least, for writers to take time explaining how bad an artist is. To do this implies, in any case, that he warrants serious attention; space in histories is not usually wasted on nonentities. We can see now that Jackson was misunderstood because the uses of the woodcut were rigidly circumscribed by tradition.
Status of the Woodcut
After the 15th century the woodcut lost its primitive power and became a self-effacing medium for creating facsimile impressions of drawings and for illustrating and decorating books, periodicals, and cheap popular broadsides. At its lowest ebb, in the late 17th century, and in the 18th, it was used to make patterns for workers in embroidery and needlework and to supply outlines for wallpaper designs to be filled in later by "paper-stainers."
The prime deficiency of the