John Baptist Jackson | Page 7

metal-- and were outside
the woodcut tradition, but they attracted attention to the old process. In
about 1726 Nicolas and Vincent Le Sueur in Paris produced some
chiaroscuros, and a year later Jackson made his first example. The Le
Sueurs followed da Carpi's method while Jackson used a loosely drawn
outline and three tint blocks in a slight variation of the Andreani style.
One characteristic was shared in common by all early chiaroscurists;
their work always reproduced drawings, usually in exact size. Jackson
added a new dimension to the medium in 1735 by beginning to work
after oil paintings.[11] His attempt to convey their scale, solidity, and

tonal range, while retaining the woodcut's breadth of execution, was
perhaps carrying the chiaroscuro into complexities for which it was not
suited. The method called for extraordinary talents in planning,
drawing, cutting, and printing, and it resulted in impressions that could
not escape a certain heaviness of effect when compared with traditional
work. Jackson's prints in this style are both daring and original, but no
later woodcutter had either the desire or the temerity to follow his
example. The method remained a dead end in chiaroscuro.
[Footnote 11: Andrea Andreani in 1599 published ten plates after
cartoons of Mantegna's nine paintings, The Triumph of Julius Caesar
(B. 11), printed from four blocks in variations of gray. But Mantegna's
cartoons were basically drawings in monochrome, and Andreani's fine
chiaroscuros did not differ appreciably from the usual examples.]
[Illustration: Tailpiece in L'Histoire naturelle eclaircie dans une de ses
parties principales, l'oryctologie, by D. d'Argenville, De Bure, Paris,
1755. This is one of the cuts Jackson made between 1725-1730. Actual
size.]

Jackson and His Work
England: Obscure Beginnings
Little is known of Jackson's early years. It is assumed that he was born
in England about 1700, although many accounts, probably based upon
Nagler, have him born in 1701. Papillon[12] conjectures that he studied
painting and engraving on wood with "an English painter" named
"Ekwits," but is not sure he remembers the name correctly. He believes
this artist engraved most of the head pieces and ornaments in Mattaire's
Latin Classics, published by J. and R. Tonson and J. Watts in London,
1713, and remarks on similarities with Jackson's style. Chatto[13]
believes these cuts were executed by Elisha Kirkall, interpreting the
initials EK appearing on one of the prints to refer to this engraver rather
than to "Ekwits." He goes on to assume that Kirkall also engraved the
blocks for Croxall's edition of Aesop's Fables, 1722, by the same

publisher, and adds that Jackson was probably his apprentice and might
have had some share in their execution. Most accounts of Jackson,
taking Chatto's word, note him as a pupil of Kirkall.
[Footnote 12: Papillon, 1766, vol. 1, p. 323. Most probably Papillon
confused "Ekwits" with Elisha Kirkall.]
[Footnote 13: Chatto and Jackson, 1861 (1st ed. 1839), p. 448.]
Linton[14] believes that only Kirkall or Jackson could have made the
cuts, "unless some Sculptor ignotus is to be credited with that most
notable book of graver-work in relief preceding the work of Bewick."
[Footnote 14: Linton, 1889, p. 130.]
But it is doubtful that Jackson was a pupil of Kirkall. For this
assumption we have the evidence of a curious and important little book,
An Enquiry into the Origins of Printing in Europe,[15] which because
of a misleading title and an anonymous author has been overlooked as a
reference source. It is a transcription of Jackson's manuscript journal
and was prepared for publication to coincide with the launching of the
wallpaper venture, Kirkall is mentioned as follows (pp. 25-26):
... I shall give a brief account of the State of Cutting on Wood in
England for the type Press before he [Jackson] went to France in 1725.
In the beginning of this Century a remarkable Blow was given to all
Cutters on Wood, by an invention of engraving on the same sort of
Metal which types are cast with. The celebrated Mr. Kirkhal, an able
Engraver on Copper, is said to be the first who performed a Relievo
Work to answer the use of Cutting on Wood. This could be dispatched
much sooner, and consequently answered the purpose of Book-sellers
and Printers, who purchased these sort of Works at a much chaper [sic]
Rate than could be expected from an Engraver on Wood....
[Footnote 15: London, 1752. Hereafter cited as the Enquiry. The first
half deals with Jackson's opinions on the origins of printing from
movable type and the progress of cutting on wood, the second half with
Jackson's career and his venture into wallpaper manufacturing. The real

content of the book was so little known that Bigmore and Wyman's
comprehensive, annotated Bibliography of Printing, London, 1880-86,
vol. 1, p. 201, described it as dealing with "certain improvements in
printing-types made