John Baptist Jackson | Page 2

details of his life were, and still are,
sparse. Later writers interpreting the comments of their predecessors
have repeated as fact much that was conjecture. The picture of Jackson
that has come down to us, therefore, is unclear and fragmentary.

If he does not emerge from this study completely accounted for from
birth to death, it has not been because of lack of effort. Biographical
data for his early and late life-- about fifty years in all-- are almost
entirely missing despite years of diligent search. As a man he remains a
shadowy figure. I have traced Jackson's life as far as the available
evidence will permit, quoting from the writings of the artist and his
contemporaries at some length to convey an essential flavor, but I have
refrained from filling in gaps by straining at conjecture.
While details of his life are vague, sufficient information is at hand to
reconstruct his personality clearly enough. After all, Jackson wrote a
book and was quoted at length in another. A contemporary
fellow-practitioner wrote about him with considerable feeling. These
and other sources give a good indication of the artist's character.
The man we have to deal with had something excessive about him; he
was headstrong, tactless, impractical, enormously energetic, a
prodigious worker, a conceiver of grandiose projects, and a relentless
hunter of patrons. He was at home with his social superiors and had
some pretentions to literary culture, he had a coarse gift for the vivid
phrase in writing, and his tastes in art ran to the classic and heroic.
This study includes an illustrated catalog of Jackson's chiaroscuros and
color prints. Previous catalogs, notably those of Nagler, Le Blanc, and
Heller, have listed no more than twenty-five works. The present catalog
more than triples this number.
To acknowledge fully the assistance given by museum curators,
librarians, archivists, and scholars on both sides of the Atlantic would
necessitate a very long list of names. However, I wish especially to
thank Mr. Peter A. Wick of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, who has
been generous enough to allow me to read his well-documented paper
on Jackson's Ricci prints; Mr. A. Hyatt Mayor of the Metropolitan
Museum of Art; Mr. Carl Zigrosser of the Philadelphia Museum of Art;
Miss Anna C. Hoyt and Mrs. Anne B. Freedberg of the Museum of
Fine Arts, Boston; Dr. Jakob Rosenberg and Miss Ruth S. Magurn of
the Fogg Art Museum; Mr. Karl Kup of the New York Public Library;
Miss Elizabeth Mongan of the Rosenwald Collection, National Gallery

of Art; Miss Una E. Johnson of the Brooklyn Museum; Mr. Gustave
von Groschwitz of the Cincinnati Art Museum; and Dr. Philip W.
Bishop of the U.S. National Museum, Smithsonian Institution.
I am particularly grateful to curators of European collections, who have
been uniformly generous in their assistance. Special thanks are due Mr.
J. A. Gere of the British Museum and Mr. James Laver of the Victoria
and Albert Museum, who have gone to considerable trouble to acquaint
me with their great collections. Others whose help must be particularly
noted are Mr. Peter Murray, Courtauld Institute of Art, University of
London; Mme. R. Maquoy-Hendrickx of the Bibliotheque Royale de
Belgique, Brussels; Dr. Vladimir Novotny of the Narodni Galerie,
Prague; Dr. Wegner of the Graphische Sammlung, Munich; Dr. Wolf
Stubbe of the Kunsthalle, Hamburg; Dr. G. Busch of the Kunsthalle,
Bremen; Dr. Hans Moehle of the Staatliche Museen, Berlin; Dr. Menz
of the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen, Dresden; Miss B. L. D. Ihle of the
Boymans Museum, Rotterdam; and M. Jean Adhemar of the
Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris.
The excellent collections of chiaroscuro prints in the Museums of the
Smithsonian Institution have formed a valuable basis for this
monograph. These prints include the set of Jackson's Venetian
chiaroscuros, originally owned by Jackson's patron, Joseph Smith,
British Consul in Venice, now in the Rosenwald Collection, National
Gallery of Art, and the representative sampling of Jackson's work in the
Division of Graphic Arts, U.S. National Museum.
I am indebted to the following museums which have kindly given
permission to reproduce Jackson prints in their collections. These are
listed by catalog number.
Smithsonian Institution 16, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22 (also in color), 24, 25, 26,
27, 28, 29, 30, 39, 50, 51, 52, 53 (also in color), 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 63
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (W. G. Russell Allen Estate) 1 (also in
color), 11, 14, 23, 33, 34, 38, 40 (also in color)
Fogg Art Museum 13 (also in color)

Worcester Art Museum 32
Metropolitan Museum of Art 5 (Rogers Fund) (also in color), 17, 31
(gift of Winslow Ames), 73 (Whittelsey Fund)
Philadelphia Museum of Art (John Frederick Lewis Collection) 2, 60,
61, 62, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 74
British Museum 2 (in color), 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12,