PRINTS & DRAWINGS BY FRANK BRANGWYN BY WALTER SHAW SPARROW E 4'Ii QlnrttBll Ittiocraitg ffiibtarjj Stliaca, Hetu ^Dtk BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME OF THE SAGE ENDOWMENT FUND THE GIFT OF HENRY W. SAGE 1891 Cornell University Library NE642.B82 S83 by..,Frank Brangwjfnj^ Prints & drawinas 670 693 3 1924 030 Overs olin Cornell University Library %1 The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924030670693 'THK MONUi\rKNr, LONDON.' SILMiN' KOK 'I UK KICHING IN 'IHK COLLECTION OV MRS. L\ON PRINTS <^ DRAWINGS BY FRANK BRANGWYN WITH SOME OTHER PHASES OF HIS ART: BY WALTER SHAW SPARROW LONDON : JOHN LANE, THE BODLEY HEAD NEW YORkI JOHN LANE COMPANY. MCMXIX ENGLAND TRINTED BY WM. BRENDON AND SON, LTD., PLYMOUTH, CONTENTS CHAfTER PAGE Introductory : Criticism, Controversy, and Writing on Art I L Emotion, Art, and Frank Brangwyn 22 II. Some Current Fallacies versus the Brangwyn Etchings 43 III. The Parallelism BETVi^EEN Brangwyn and Legros as Etchers 59 IV. His Earliest Etchings ..... 78 V. Etchings : Simple Landscapes and Wayfaring Sketches 85 VI. Etchings : Windmills and Watermills 96 VII. Etchings : A Few Bridges . 104 VIII. Etchings : Barges, Boats, and Hulks 117 IX. Etchings : Industry and Labour 127 X. Architecture in the Brangwyn Etchings . 140 XI. Brangwyn, Art, and National Welfare 161 XII. Brangwyn, London, and National Welfare 166 XIII. Peace and War in Brangyttn's Posters 181 XIV. After the War : Reformation and Re-formation : Brangwyn in Relation to Labour Clubs and Halls 199 XV. Book Illustration and Decoration 213 XVI. Brangwyn Woodcuts and Brush Drawings . 224 XVII. Brangwyn and English Water-colour 23s XVIII. Pastels and Other Designs . 247 XIX. Brangwyn's Versatility : and the World's Distrust of the Versatile 254 LIST OF PLATES " The Monument, London." Study for Etching No. 200. In the Collection of Mrs. Lyon ....... Frontispiece " Shipbuilding." From a Water-colour Sketch . ... To face f. 8 Sketch for a Panel in MuUgardt's Court of the Ages, Panama " Exhibition, {^he Blocks lent hy The Studio Magazine ") . ,, 12 A Study of Monks in Brangwyn's Cartoon for a Panel in St. Aidan's Church, Leeds 16 ......... ,, Study for a Bookplate. {By permission of the Rowley Gallery, Kensington, London) ........ J) " Mowers at Work." From the Original Lithograph " The Crucifixion." A Study in Coloured Crayons reproduced in Facsimile . Betwe, Sketch of Stone Masons at Work Industrial Light and Heat : " Iron Workers." In the Collection of the Japanese Government ...... " Is There Truth in Drink ? " From the Original Lithograph " Industrial Stress and Strain : " Steel Example of Preliminary Work for the Panels in Cleveland Court House, Ohio, U.S.A " The Valley of the Lot." From a Water-colour in the Collection of Miss Hope ......... " Mater Dolorosa Belgica " : A Study reproduced in Facsimile Between pp. 64 and 65 " The Feast of Lazarus." After the Second State of Etching No. 28' 139, on zinc, X19I-' To face f. 68 " Revolt." From a Chalk Sketch „ 72 " St. Leonard's Abbey, near Tours." Rembrandt Photogravure after a Recent Etching not yet catalogued 80 .... ,, " Building the New Kensington Museum." Study in Water- colour for Etching No. 52 ...... „ 88 " Pont Neuf, Paris." Rembrandt Photogravure after a Recent Etching not yet catalogued 104 ....... ,, " Church of Notre Dame, Eu." Sketch in Water-colour for Etch- . 1 ing No. 143. {By permission of R. A. Workman, Esq.) . ,, 12 " The Return from Work in a Shipyard." Rembrandt Photo- gravure after Etching No. 107, on zinc, 31I" x zii" . „ 120 " Men in a Bakehouse at Montreuil-sur-Mer." Rembrandt Photo- 20" gravure after Etching No. 132, on zinc, X 25^-" . „ 128 " Coal-mine after an Explosion." Rembrandt Photogravure after Etching No. 59, on zinc, 19" x 24^" „ 136 " Church of Notre Dame at Eu." After Etching No. 143, on zinc, 30^-' X 23J' ,144 '* The Cloisters of Airvault Church." Rembrandt Photogravure after a Recent Etching not yet catalogued . „ 152 Between PRINTS &> DRAWINGS ; PRINTS AND DRAWINGS INTRODUCTORY: CRITICISM, CONTROVERSY AND WRITING ON ART good story may be told usefully about an American visitor in London, a dollar democrat and dictator, who liked very much the modern movements in art and literature. He had no wish to put his money into furniture that belonged, more or less, to half a dozen centuries and countries never did he yearn to set up his quarters in a museum house as variously old as Warwick Castle, nor in a new " classic " mansion shining with marble and Portland stone ; and, more noteworthy still, he was discreet enough to believe that the Old Masters of painting would live on all right without help from his millions. Dealers were troubled, perplexed, annoyed, astounded ; and the millionaire's secretary—not a girl in those days, but a plain man accented in Philadelphia and sharpened in New York—was bored all day long by the silken guile of certain high financiers of the Trade who baited their traps with mercantile warnings and costly master- pieces. As collectors like to tell themselves with pride that they are expert investors, the American heard that modernized art was unsafe, a mere quicksand that swallowed up changing fashions. Young executors got near to grey hair when they had to turn yesterday's fame into gold at auctions. Great dealers alone were safe trustees for posterity when much money had to be lent at a proper interest to the fine arts. Had they not for sale many old pictures so far- famed, and so coveted by public museums, those glorious paupers in the markets, that a millionaire could buy them at their present Alpine prices and yet be aware that he had gilt-framed securities, whose money value would continue to leap upwards? "Very tropical, these old big boys," the American said. " Could I not keep hot in winter, blizzard or no blizzard, if I looked at their prices ? But I'm out to see the young big boys, who're in flesh and blood still. — thank my lucky stars. So I take my choice—and go slow. There's Lutyens. You know Lutyens ? He's good enough for me in architec- ture. Nojack and the Beanstalk in Lutyens; he didn't grow out of nothing except magic. He's all there himself, but with some ages and sages in him. And I'm captured by two or three British painters. Not more at present. Don't ask me to be a hotel where volunteers lodge and do what they please. Some years ago I set my eye rang- ing over Brangwyn, who's as easy to see as New York if he comes your way. Here's my man in etching and my man with the big brush. Large . ! He's mighty large is Brangwyn. Have I seen already some acres of Brangwyn? Maybe more. Yes. And I've seen a bit of him in the States, where Nature and the towns are all large: and Brangwyn's in scale. Aren't you tickled with joy when a big painter in the States keeps his backbone and his own size and space, refusing to be fixed up as a pigmy for a cabinet? You see what I mean ? Stars, but you ought to see ! Let me fudge a bit with words, then. Great nations and times. They don't need painters who're only villages in genius. What they need are big fellows who're provinces in genius. You agree? Surely. Gulliver's — grand among the Lilliputians ; but tell me what he is in Brobding- nag? Is he more than a bit of human snufF for a splendid giantess to take in with her breath through the corridors of her nostrils? No ! And I maintain, too, that our age is too much of a Brobding- nag for most painters, etchers, sculptors, and writers. Let me have Brangwyn, then, and a few others. Not more. 'Few but Fit' is my motto." One evening the millionaire talked in this way to a knot of guests several painters and several writers on art. He had seen the Brang- wyns in the Skinners' Hall, and they made him feel quite small enough to be happy. But all at once he noticed that his guests were mum and glum. They fingered their bread restlessly, and their nostrils looked bellicose. The millionaire wondered why. Was Brangwyn not their man? Did they dislike the Brangwyn paint and colour, opulent, sumptuous, alive? or his lusty manliness, a generous great swagger free from bombast, and as natural and way- ward as winds, harvests, and the sea? These questions were to a friendly evening what sparks are to a train of gunpowder. One by one the guests made F. B. into their target, and soon they shot their criticisms so rapidly that volley-firing began. The American raised his eyebrows and listened with amused, ironic patience. "Well, gentlemen," he said at last, "you've talked, and I'll admit that a painter you dislike might write much in praise of deafness. But I know a thing or two. In my time I've cursed the Rockies, for the Rockies don't suit me when I'm tired, stale, cheap, and glad to be coddled by my daughter. Is Brangwyn too robust for you, gentlemen ? Is he your Rockies ? It must be so if you mean what you have said. But it can't be helped. Mishaps in sympathy and taste come of their own accord ; but if Brangwyn had been born in my own country, and if I disliked him as much as you do, I should still be no end proud that he belonged to the States, as I want the States to be large and great all round.