File:Ariadne florentina; six lectures on wood and metal engraving, with appendix; given before the University of Oxford in Michaelmas term, 1872. (1892) (14762870622).jpg

Identifier: ariadneflorentin1892rusk (find matches)
Title: Ariadne florentina; six lectures on wood and metal engraving, with appendix; given before the University of Oxford in Michaelmas term, 1872.
Year: 1892 (1890s)
Authors: Ruskin, John, 1819-1900 Norton, Charles Eliot, 1827-1908, author of introduction, etc
Subjects: Engraving Wood-engraving
Publisher: New York : Charles E. Merrill & Co.
Contributing Library: Boston Public Library
Digitizing Sponsor: Boston Public Library

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will at onceunderstand the difference between a primarilyornamental, and a primarily realistic, style.The first requirement in the Florentine work,is that it shall be a lovely arrangement oflines; a pretty thing upon a page. Bewicklias a secondary notion of making his vignettea pretty thing upon a page. But he is over-powered by his vigorous veracity, and bentfirst on giving you his idea of Venus. Quiteright, he would have been, mind you, if he hadbeen carving a statue of her on Mount Eryx ;but not when he was engraving a vignette to^sops fables. To engrave well is to ornamenta surface well, not to create a realistic impression.I beg your pardon for my repetitions ; but thepoint at issue is the root of the whole business,and I must get it well asserted, and variously. Let me pass to a more important example. 128. Three years ago, in the rough firstarrangement of the copies in the EducationalSeries, I put an outline of the top of Apollossceptre, which, in the catalogue, was said to be
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MIBaQGlAXX^aaUL-. III. ■ At evnin^, from the top of Fesole. METAL ENGRAVING. 129 probably by Baccio Bandini of Florence, foryour first real exercise; it remains so, the olivebeing put first only for its mythological rank. The series of engravings to which the platefrom which that exercise is copied belongs, arepart of a number, executed chiefly, I think,from early designs of Sandro Botticelli, andsome in great part by his hand. He and hisassistant, Baccio, worked together ; and in suchharmony, that Bandini probably often does whatSandro wants, better than Sandro could havedone it himself; and, on the other hand, thereis no design of Bandinis over which Sandro doesnot seem to have had influence. And wishing now to show you three ex-amples of the finest work of the old, the re-naissance, and the modern schools,—of theold, I will take Baccio Bandinis Astrologia,Plate III., opposite. Of the renaissance, DiirersAdam and Eve. And of the modern, this headof the daughter of Herodias, engr

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