Audubon’s monument

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DSCN2165In 1842, needing more land for a cemetery, Trinity Parish purchased 24 acres of the upper Manhattan estate owned by the naturalist and painter John James Audubon (1785-1851). When Audubon passed away, he was buried in Trinity cemetery with only a small sDSCN2166tone marker.

Also buried in the Audubon vault are his wife Lucy Bakewell Audubon, their children and grandchildren, and Audubon’s friend, the musician Anton Philipp Heinrich.

Aububon’s grave was later moved and funds were raised, under the leadership of Thomas Egleston (1832-1900), for a 25-foot monument. Along with a portrait of the artist are two dozen carved birds and quadrupeds; a painter’s easel and brushes; and two of Audubon’s rifles, one of which is held in Firestone Library’s Audubon collection. The October 30, 1892, New York Times noted:

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“In May last a fourteen-ton block of North River bluestone, quarried in Malden Township, in the Catskills, near Saugerties, arrived at the marble yards of R.C. Fischer & Co., at Corlears Hook. Since then the stone has been cut into a monument in the form of a Celto-Runic cross, which will soon be erected in Trinity Cemetery over the tomb of Audubon, the naturalist, artist, and ornithologist. The cross is in one solid piece, 19 feet high, and weighs seven tons.”

 

 

DSCN2179“…The monument is 25 feet high. The color of the stone is a beautiful bluish-gray. The monument was designed and modeled and the work upon it personally superintended by Eugene Pflister, foreman of R. C. Fischer & Co. It has cost $10,000. Some of the minor work remains to be done, but it will be ready to be unveiled by the latter part of November. The monument will be unveiled by Miss Audubon, the grand-daughter of Audubon.”

 

 

Note Audubon’s California Vulture over his portrait, taken directly from the image in his Birds of America. The first scientific paper Audubon delivered concerned the vulture and its sense of smell.

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For more information, see: Audubon Park: http://www.audubonparkny.com

Audubon Monument: http://audubonparkny.com/AudubonParkAudubonTomb1.html

Trinity Cemetery: http://audubonparkny.com/AudubonParkTrinityCemeteryTour.html

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Former Princeton Instructor Thomas B. Cornell, 1937-2012

 

cornell                                                       cornell

Thomas Browne Cornell, the Richard E. Steele Artist-in-Residence Emeritus at Bowdoin College and former Princeton Instructor, passed away on December 7, 2012. We hold a number of books with original prints by the artist, as well as a dozen proofs for The Monkey (Northampton, Mass.: Apiary Press, 1959). Graphic Arts Collection Oversize NE 2210.C6 M6 1959Q.

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From 1969 to 1971, Cornell taught in the Visual Arts Program at Princeton University and then, transferred to Bowdoin where he established their studio arts program. While at Princeton, Cornell was one of the first instructors to teach from the newly established classrooms at 185 Nassau.

cornellIn the Daily Princetonian Special Class of 1974 Issue, (20 June 1970), Andrew Wilson noted that, “Princeton’s Creative Arts Program is in the ascending mode, both in terms of student interest and instruction offered. Created in 1939, the Program has only come into its own in the last few years. Now, it has its own building — 185 Nassau Street, a converted elementary school — a full range of courses, and cooperative programs with the English and Art and Archaeology departments.”

“The Program is graced with an outstanding staff; writers-in-residence of recent years have been Phillip Portnoy’s Complaint Roth, Elizabeth Bowen, and National Book Award winner Jerzy Kosinski. This year’s writers include: one of England’s most noted men of letters, Anthony Burgess, author of The Long Day Wanes, A Clockwork Orange, and many more novels and critical works; …The Program’s staff in other fields is equally impressive. It includes artists Esteban Vicente, Lennart Anderson and Thomas Cornell.”

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Although he later focused on painting, Cornell’s early work was in printmaking. According to the Bowdoin obituary, “his  first publication, The Monkey, examined the process of evolution.  His next publication by the Gehenna Press was The Defense of Gracchus Babeuf, including twenty-one portraits of French revolutionary figures.  In the 1960’s, he established the Tragos Press, and the first editions focused on Frederick Douglass and Bayard Rustin. Responding to the Vietnam War, Cornell painted a triptych, The Dance of Death, in 1969.  In the 1970s, he returned to the exploration of images of nature, using them to address modern social and environmental ethical concerns.”

cornell-monkey7Printer’s proof

Fifty of the Best Receipts for the Aquatinter 1801

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John Hippisley Green, The Complete Aquatinter: being the whole process of etching and engraving in aquatinta: the method of using the aquafortis, with all the necessary tools: to which are added upwards of fifty of the best receipts for grounds, varnishes, &c.: collected from near a hundred that are most in use: the difficulties which may possibly occur, are point out, and the method of obviating them: the whole rendered clear and practical (London: Printed for J.H. Green, book and printseller…, 1801). Graphic Arts Collection GAX 2013- in process

This printing manual includes two plates drawn and engraved by John Hippisley Green along with his recipes (using the modern word) for soft and hard ground aquatint. The frontispiece is after a landscape engraving by Joseph Jeakes. The Princeton copy of this first edition includes various annotations and a hand written description of the soft ground process.

Green advertises his services as:

J.H. Green, having received great encouragement from the lovers and patrons of the fine arts, &c. takes the liberty to inform them, that he is now enabled to deal in a more extensive manner, in all kind of prints, ancient and modern, from the earliest period to the present day. Books, the most useful and pleasing in the English language, particularly relating to Arts and Sciences, &c. drawing materials of all kinds, as chalks, crayons, water-colours, sketch, and drawing-books, drawing-boards, portfolios, &c. &c. bought, sold, and exchanged; drawings mounted, framed, &c. Etching Wax and every requisite for engraving, aquatinting, &c. that may be depended on as the best that can be procured. Drawing taught in all its various Branches at Mr. Green’s Academy every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday after-noon. Ladies and Gentlemen attended at their residences, and schools taught on moderate terms. Drawings and designs made, portraits taken and executed in all the various methods of drawing.

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The Ragged School

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George Cruikshank (1792-1878), The Ragged School In West Street (late Chick Lane) Smithfield, [1846]. Pencil, ink, and watercolor. Original design for an etching published in Our Own Times, 1846. Graphic Arts Collection GA2013- in process

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When in London, you can visit the Ragged School Museum, housed in three canalside buildings that once formed one of the largest ragged or free schools. According to the museum’s history site, “when Thomas Barnardo came to London from his home city of Dublin in 1866 … he was confronted by a city where disease was rife, poverty and overcrowding endemic and educational opportunities for the poor were non-existent. He watched helplessly as a cholera epidemic swept through the East End…. He gave up his medical training to pursue his local missionary works and in 1867 opened his first “ragged school” where children could gain a free basic education.”

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Ragged or free schools for London’s poor children existed long before Barnardo’s, usually set up in one room of a house. George Cruikshank (1792-1878) designed a view of such a classroom to illustrate his book Our Own Times, (Cohn 193). Published monthly from April to July 1846, each part had one original etching along with a total of 41 other illustrations.
Cruikshank’s scene divides the school into two sections, one for girls on the right and one for boys on the left. Note the self-portrait at the bottom right corner, signed “self, GC.”

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Goethe remarked, “One cannot have a sense of humour unless one be without conscience or responsibility.” By the end of the year, Cruikshank’s moral conscience had overtaken his interest in caricature and frivolous entertainment. He gave up drinking and smoking, joined the temperance movement, and in 1847 began the 8 plates for The Bottle.

 

James Stewart is moving again

How do you get a three foot flat file through a two and a half foot door? This is one of the many challenges we are facing with the renovation of Firestone Library. Here are a few shots from this morning. Special thanks to the men of Clancy-Cullen moving company.

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What is in this file drawer? See below.


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James Stewart in Cowboy Hat

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Alpha Botanica

According to Sarah Horowitz, Alpha Botanica “began in the fall of 2004 with a few trial capitals and many sketches to ascertain the viability of a Yiddish-English book of poems illustrated with engraved images and capitals. From this grew designs for two sets of botanical alphabets, one Roman and one Hebrew.”

The printing of the first half was accomplished in 2006 by Chris Stern of Stern & Faye Printers, who unfortunately passed away before it could be completed. Arthur Larson of Horton Tank Graphics finished the book and Claudia Cohen bound the edition of 45 copies. Depicted behind each letter is a plant whose name begins with that letter. The list of plants and the colophon are found in the center of the volume.

Alpha Botanica, engravings by Sarah Horowitz ([Portland]: Wiesedruck, 2007). Copy 32 of 45. Graphic Arts Collection GAX 2013- in process

http://wiesedruck.com/about/

Figures Made Visible in the Sadness of Time

everwine coverFigures Made Visible in the Sadness of Time. Designed by Michele Burgess, poetry by Peter Everwine, etching by Bill Kelly (San Diego: Brighton Press, 2003). Copy 8 of 40. Graphic Arts Collection GAX Oversize 2004-0236Q

“This book was designed by the artists in close collaboration with the poet and Michele Burgess. The poems were printed letterpress by Nelle Martin and the etchings were hand wiped by the artists and printed with the assistance of Alvin Buenaventura. The tea-dyed linen cover bears a stencil that was hand cut by the artists and hand stamped through twelve templates by Sonja Jones. An original pochoir appears on the title page.” –Colophon

 

“Kelly has everwine4collaborated with the poetry of Peter Everwine to illustrate “Figures Made Visible in the Sadness of Time,” writes Marcia Manna. “The shape of a dragonfly is embedded as an etching on one page and also displayed on a long scroll, embellished with sparkles and vibrant shades of blue. Kelly said the image represents the fleeting moments when something is recognized and then disappears. ‘To be very literal about something means you are just seeing, and Peter operates in a world of transcendent beauty,’ Kelly said. ‘He’s one of the few poets I’ve worked with who understands art in a deep physical sort of way. The great thing about these books and art is that one doesn’t illustrate the other. One broadens the view of the other and it becomes something bigger.’”– “These books are also works of art,” by Marcia Manna (2004)

There is in me, always,
you and the absence of you.

There is in me, always,
that road that leads to a fieldeverwine 3
of flowers we once knew

in that place where you were young,
there, where Memory keeps a life
of its own in the dark,

like a plant that waits patiently
year after year, asleep and folded inward
until the appointed night arrives

when it stirs and wakes
and opens out—Oh dream flowering!
Darkness flowering into darkness!—

forms, figures made visible
in the sadness of Time.

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Woodrow Wilson of New Jersey

woodrow wilson 3 Drawing for On to Washington (New York: Puck magazine, 1912). Pen and ink, watercolor on board. Graphic Arts Collection GA 2009.00472

The Graphic Arts Collection holds a preliminary drawing for the cover of Puck magazine’s special campaign number of October 23, 1912. It features the classic Puck cherub and vignettes of Woodrow Wilson and Thomas Marshal. Unfortunately, Princeton’s copies of Puck do not include the 1912 issue and the digital version is in black and white. Happily, the Italian site “tipsimages” offers a thumbnail of the issue’s cover, seen below.

Wilson won the election with 41.9 percent of the vote to Roosevelt’s 27.4 percent and Taft’s 23 percent. Socialist Party candidate Eugene Debs won 6 percent. In the electoral college count, Wilson won in forty states, giving him 435 votes. Roosevelt carried only six states, earning 88 votes.

On to Washington!http://www.tipsimages.it/

Here’s is a campaign film made by the Democratic National Committee for Wilson in 1912, making fun of Taft.

Hoe’s Eight Cylinder Printing Press

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The New Year’s Address by the Carriers of the Public Ledger, January 1, 1852 ([Philadelphia: Public Ledger, 1851]). Broadside. Graphic Arts Collection GA2013- in process. Gift of Garrett Scott, in honor of Dale Roylance, with special thanks to Donald Farren, Class of 1958, for his assistance.

After leaving school at the age of fifteen, Richard March Hoe (1812-1886) joined his father’s New York printing business and went on to transform the entire printing industry.

Henry Lewis Bullen wrote a history of Richard Hoe for The Inland Printer:  “In 1834 the firm of R. Hoe & Co. consisted of Richard March Hoe and Matthew Smith, cousins, both twenty-two years of age, and Sereno Newton. The business was carried on in Gold Street, between Fulton and John streets, and in Ryder’s alley, leading off Gold Street, eastward. They were then the only makers of cylinder presses in America, and, in addition to making four kinds of cylinder presses, they made cases, chases and almost everything then used in printing except types and inks.” public ledger 3

“…The first record we have of the inventive genius of Richard March Hoe is the patent issued in 1843 for the first application of air springs to cylinder presses. …In 1844 he was the first to place type-high adjustable bearers on each side of the beds of cylinder presses. In 1845 he patented the first automatic sheet flier. Prior to this invention the sheets were taken from the cylinders by hand. In the same year the galley proof press was first put on the market by R. Hoe & Co., the idea coming to them from a printer in Boston. All these inventions are in common use today.”

“In 1846 Richard March Hoe patented a “steam inking apparatus” for automatically inking forms on Washington hand presses, and a number were sold. This apparatus displaced one operator on a hand press. It had two rollers. Notwithstanding the gradual increase of cylinder presses and their improvement, in 1846 the bulk of the printing was still done on hand presses.”

“The year 1847 saw the advent of fast cylinder presses. In that year, on July 24, Richard March Hoe patented his type revolving newspaper press, of which in its largest development we present a picture. The English patent was issued on May 4 of the same year. The first of these presses had four impression cylinders, and was installed in the plant of the Philadelphia Public Ledger in 1847. This press made 10,000 impressions an hour. It worked so satisfactorily that the proprietor of the Ledger accepted it immediately and ordered a second press. From that time until the present America has held the foremost place in the development of printing presses.”

In 1851, to celebrate the end of a successful year, the Public Ledger printed this New Year’s broadside featuring a large wood engraving by Illman & sons of the paper’s eight cylinder press.

Waud draws the Battle of Memphis

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According to the Naval Historical Center under the Department of the Navy, “the CSS General Beauregard, a 454-ton side-wheel river steamer, was built at Algiers, Louisiana in 1847 as a towboat. Under the name Ocean, she was taken over by the Confederacy in January 1862 and converted a “cottonclad” ram.

Renamed General Beauregard, she was commissioned as part of the River Defense Fleet in April 1862 and sent up the Mississippi to Tennessee. She took part in the naval actions off Fort Pillow on 10 May 1862 and Memphis on 6 June. In the latter action, General Beauregard closely engaged the Federal ram Monarch and ironclad Benton before being disabled and sunk.”

Londwaudon-born Alfred Rudolph Waud (1828-1891) was one of 30 soldier/sketch artists documenting the American Civil War. Often incorrectly listed as Ward, the artist immigrated to Boston in 1850, went to work for the New York Illustrated News in 1860, and transferred to Harper’s Weekly a year later.

Waud was present for the Battle of Memphis or Battle of the Rams on June 6. Three weeks later, a series of his sketches had been translated into wood engravings and published in Harper’s Weekly June 28 issue. Although this image was not included in the magazine, it was engraved and prints of the scene are held in public collections.

Alfred Rudolph Waud (1828-1891), Monarch Ramming the Beauregard, [1862]. Pencil, ink and wash sketch. Graphic Arts Collection GA 2006.02563