Mindful that digital manipulation of imagery is a recent phenomenon, what are some of the techniques used by early printmakers to alter images?
One of the more interesting traditions
of what is now described in digital terms as “cutting and pasting” began in the
seventeenth century with English portrait engravings. Some of the more
enterprising (and perhaps less ethical) printmakers and their publishers at
this time sought to reduce the labour cost of producing portraits of their
clients by erasing the faces portrayed in earlier printing plates and substituting
portraits of their new clients. Sometimes these replaced faces were augmented
with minor changes to the figures’ surroundings.
For example in John Faber's mezzotint, George
Byng, Viscount Torrington, not only is Byng’s face replaced in the altered
plate, Edward Vernon, but the ledge
on which Byng rests his right hand has been replaced with the barrel of a
cannon on which Vernon’s hand rests.
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John Faber the elder (c. 1660–1721)
(left) George Byng, Viscount Torrington, 1718 (state I) (middle and right) Edward Vernon (states IV; V) Mezzotint, 35.2 x 25 cm (Layard, George Somes 1927, Catalogue Raisonne of Engraved British Portraits From Altered Plates, From the Notes of George Somes Layard, Arranged by H. M. Latham, Philip Allan, London, p. 16.) |
The removal and replacing of
imagery in plates such as these is made almost seamlessly by the medium of
mezzotint. In a way the process of mezzotint is a bit like the building up of
an image by pixels in that the image on the plate is created by tiny dots. In Frank
Short’s demonstration print of the mezzotint process The Elements of Mezzotint (shown below) Short explains this
engraving process:
The upper
portion is intended to exhibit the work of the rocker, and for that purpose it
is divided into two parts. The uppermost or lightest part was prepared in the
same way as the darker subdivision immediately under it, but it was afterwards
scraped quite clear of bur so as to exhibit the effects of the rocker’s
teeth in digging into the copper. The nine strong dotted lines are lines of “ways,”
showing the direction of rocking. Here
they are etched; in a plate intended for future work they are temporarily
marked in chalk [see detail below].
The whole of
the lower example was rocked “full,” showing the depth to be obtained by
leaving bur untouched and also qualities of shade to be obtained by its partial
removal with the scraper [see detail
further below]. (Hamerton, PG 1892, Drawing & Engraving: A Brief Exposition of Technical Principles and
Practice, Adam and Charles Black, London
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Frank Short (1857–1945)
The Elements of Mezzotint, 1892
Mezzotint on wove paper
16 x 10.8 cm
Condition: pristine condition
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This print has been sold
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Detail of upper portion |
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Detail of lower portion |
The alterations to these early
plates often went further than a chopping and changing of faces and their
surroundings. Like the facility offered by “Exposure” and “Curve” tools in Adobe’s
Photoshop software, the mezzotint engravers could also adjust the tonal
contrast in the plates by applying the process outlined above by Frank Short to
either give or remove a note of theatrical drama produced by lighting. Compare
for instance the change in the tonal contrast between R Williams’ Thomas Betterton and the transfiguration
to William Faithorne’s Sir William Read
(see below). Interestingly, Thomas Betterton
(1635–1710) was, according to Layard (1927), the “most eminent tragedian of the
Restoration period.” Sir William Read (d. 1715), on the other hand, was “an itinerant
quack, and was knighted for curing seamen and soldiers of blindness, and made
oculist to Queen Anne” (Layard, George Somes 1927, Catalogue Raisonne of Engraved British Portraits From Altered Plates,
From the Notes of George Somes Layard, Arranged by H. M. Latham, Philip
Allan, London, p. 9.)
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R. Williams
(left) Thomas Betterton (state I)
William Faithorne the younger (1656–1701?)
(right) Sir William Read (state IV)
Mezzotint, 33.9 x 25 cm
(Layard, George Somes 1927, Catalogue Raisonne of Engraved British
Portraits From Altered Plates, From the Notes of George Somes Layard, Arranged
by H. M. Latham, Philip Allan, London, p. 8.)
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Even the most acclaimed and
accomplished mezzotint artists engaged in altering their plates to accommodate
fresh faces. For instance, Valentine Green (1739–1813) is arguably one Britain’s finest
mezzotint portrait artists and yet he too loosened his artistic integrity to
allow his print, Isabella, Duchess of Rutland, to be morphed into Frederica, Duchess of York (shown
below). In terms of what may be seen as minor changes to the portrayal of
Isabella to accommodate Frederica—alterations to the hat, upper section of the gown
and, of course, a facial reconstruction (see both images further below)—there
is a significant change to the projected meaning of the two portraits. In the
portrait of Isabelle, our focus is allowed to move away from her face to dwell
on the exquisite rendering of her gown and the composition as a whole. In the
portrait of Frederica, however, our eye is held by contact with Isabelle’s
attention directed to us. In short, Frederica is looking at us in a way that is
difficult to disengage from. This seemingly subtle shift in projected meaning
is what makes both images uniquely different even though they are both
essentially made of the same pictorial ingredients.
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Valentine Green (1739–1813)
Frederica, Duchess of
After Sir Joshua Reynolds
Mezzotint, 63.4 x 38.8 cm
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Detail of Frederica, Duchess of |
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Valentine Green (1739–1813)
(left) Isabella,
Duchess of Rutland, 1780 (state I)
(right) Frederica, Duchess of York, 1793
(states IV)
Mezzotint, 35.2 x 25 cm
(Layard, George Somes 1927, Catalogue Raisonne of Engraved British
Portraits From Altered Plates, From the Notes of George Somes Layard, Arranged
by H. M. Latham, Philip Allan, London, p. 109.)
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Although the practice of altering
images (i.e. changing an image so that the adjustments present a different interpretation
of the subject) seems on the surface to be a straight forward activity in terms
of pushing imagery around, the issue is usually more complex than this. For
most artists their practice is governed by intention (i.e. a leaning to
rationalise one’s practice and to “say” something that goes beyond the creative
urge). There is also the problematic issue of ethics (i.e. a set of professional
values that determines whether the use of certain imagery is appropriate) and
aesthetics (i.e. a personal concern for quality that is lightly married to a
concern to be authentic to one’s personal sensitivities). Essentially the practice
of altering images is usually underpinned by discipline specific issues guiding an artist’s hand.
