Monthly Archives: April 2014

Las Antillas Letradas by Antonio Martorell

Las Antillas LetradasPosted with thanks to Fernando Acosta Rodriguez, Librarian for Latin American Studies

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Princeton’s Graphic Arts Collection is delighted to announce that it has acquired the first copy of Puerto Rican graphic artist Antonio Martorell’s most recent work, Las Antillas Letradas.  Combining to create a massive map of the Antilles when placed in alphabetical order, the 27 prints in the portfolio juxtapose digital prints originating in a 19th century map, texts of the selected authors in their original languages, and woodcuts of the letters of the alphabet and the corresponding names and faces of the letrados or lettered authors.

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“Our islands spread over the Caribbean Sea as a deck of cards fanned out on a game table.  Perilous is our order, and an alphabet pretending to be literary does not have to obey in its creation the rules of dictionary or compass. 

The increasingly stingy Spanish alphabet, dispensing with the beloved “Chs” and “Lls”, has hindered an already tormenting and exclusionary selection, forcing me to unravel names and surnames in order to find the nearly drowned letter and rescue it from the wreck of oblivion.  I have dared to transform an X into a W in an effort to include voices from the main literary languages of our islands, Spanish, English and French.

In its elaboration, the map of the Antilles configured itself as echo of a colorful patchwork quilt or of nautical pennants crossing land and sea borders without visa or passport.  Anchored on words, provoking images, echoes of dreams and nightmares, our letters are not so different from our islands, subject to hurricanes and earthquakes, to invasions and exiles, saved from capsizing by their irrepressible will to be and to make.” –Antonio Martorell

 

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Las Antillas Letradas was printed in 2014 on Okawara paper in a Hewlett Packard printer at the Playa de Ponce Workshop in Puerto Rico with the assistance of Milton Ramírez.  The edition consists of 100 numbered copies signed by Antonio Martorell.

 

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Antonio Martorell, Las Antillas Letradas, 2014. 27 multi-media prints. Copy 1/100. Graphic Arts Collection GAX2014- in process. Purchased with funds provided by the Program in Latin American Studies.
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Bridge on the Delaware at Trenton, New Jersey

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William Constable (1783-1861, active in the United States 1806-1808), Bridge on the Delaware at Trenton, New Jersey, September 10, 1807. Pencil and wash drawing. Gift of Leonard L. Milberg, Class of 1953. Graphic Arts Collection GC023

Twenty-three year old William Constable (1783-1861) arrived in the United States at the end of June 1806 and spent the summer sketching the waterfalls of New Jersey and New York. For the next two years, he and his brother Daniel traveled across the United States with a dog named Benjamin Franklin.

Constable kept a series of sketchbooks, recording the exact date and location that he painted. Thanks to this, we know he circled back to New Jersey the second year to create this view of the Trenton bridge, only in its second year of operation. The innovative structure was the first bridge across the Delaware and of particular interest to Constable, who returned to England to become a civil engineer and surveyor.

His career took a turn in 1841, when Constable taught himself to make daguerreotypes and opened the first photographic portrait studio in Brighton. To read more about his years in the United States, see Early topographical views of North America by William Constable (1783-1861) (New York, N.Y.: Wunderlich, 1984). Graphic Arts Collection (GA) 2004-0712N

Constable also created the view below of the Mill at Parkman Town, on the Head Water of Grand River in 1806.

constable millWilliam Constable (1783-1861), Mill at Parkman Town on the Headwater of Grand River Emptying into Lake Erie-New Connecticut State Ohio, October 31, 1806. Watercolor. Gift of Leonard L. Milberg, Class of 1953. Graphic Arts Collection GC023

Toover-Schijf

phenikistoscope2A trade card for the Amsterdam microscope salesman Abraham van Emden (1794-1860) described him as a physical, mathematical, and optical instrument maker. He also handled thermometers, barometers, lenses, compasses, and other scientific devices.

In the 1830s, van Emden manufactured Toover-schijf [magic or enchanted disks], an early hand-held variation of the phenakistoscope. The Graphic Arts Collection recently acquired one of his marbled boxes of toover-schijf, which includes 9 lithographic disks with sequential images, one guide disc with viewing slots, and a wood handle. Standing in front of a mirror, the user spins the disk while looking through the moving slots and sees a moving image.

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According to van Emden, “one will be surprised by the floating enchantment, bringing to the eye of the beholders, the alternating movement of the figures.” On most, there are figurative images on one side and geometric on the other, with a separate sequence around the center hole.

The invention of the fantascope or phenakistoscope is usually credited to Joseph Plateau (1801-1883), taking the name from the Greek word phenakizein, meaning to deceive or cheat. The eye of the viewer is deceived into thinking it sees a moving image. The Costen Children’s Library has one of Plateau’s devices: Joseph Antoine Ferdinand Plateau (1801-1883), Fantascope invented by Prof. Plateau (London: Ackermann, [1833]). CTSN Opticals 2282.

See also: Peter de Clercq in A History of Science in the Netherlands (Leiden; Boston: Brill, 1999). Firestone Library (F) Q127.N2 H58 1999
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John William Hill’s Boston

hill boston drawingJohn William Hill (1812-1879), Boston, 1853. Watercolor on paper. Graphic Arts Collection GA 2013.00858. Gift of Leonard L. Milberg, Class of 1953.

 

In 2002, Leonard L. Millberg, Class of 1953, donated a group of drawings and watercolors to the Princeton University Art Museum and to the Graphic Arts Collection in Firestone Library. Among the twenty-three works were a pair by the American artist John William Hill (1812-1879), the son of the British aquatintist John Hill (1799–1836). Thanks to Mr. Milberg, the Graphic Arts Collection has a number of J.W. Hill’s most important birds-eye view cityscapes, several of which have already been posted.

The first work [seen above] is a finished watercolor on a grand scale and the other [seen below], the steel engraving after that painting. Within the view of Boston and its harbor, we see the statehouse dome rising in the center background and the Bunker Hill Monument at far right.

hill boston printCharles Mottram (1807-1876) after a watercolor by John William Hill (1812-1879), Boston, 1857. Steel engraving. Graphic Arts Collection GA 2013.00859. Gift of Leonard L. Milberg, Class of 1953.

 

Although Hill painted Boston in 1853, it took four years before the engraving by Charles Mottram was published jointly between Paul & Dominic Colnaghi & Company in London, Smith Brothers & Company in New York, and F. Delarue by in Paris. Due to the enormous popularity of the print, at least one other impression was published by the firm of McQueen.

For our students, this set offers the rare opportunity to study how a painting is translated into an ink print and the amazing ability of the engraver to capture details. Even the clouds in the sky are rendered with accuracy and depth.
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To read more about Mr. Milberg’s contributions to the Princeton University Library, see: http://tinyurl.com/mkzgrvm