GRAVEN IMAGES: A PORTFOLIO OF NINETEENTH CENTURY WOOD ENGRAVINGS PRINTED FROM THE ORIGINAL BLOCKS

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4to. cloth-backed paper covered boards, paper cover and spine labels. 6, 13 wood cuts, (2) pages. With a Foreword by L.F. Thompson. First edition. One of 100 numbered copies. Wood engravers toiling away at their trade during the last quarter of the nineteenth century could be forgiven for feeling a touch of despair. Since the early 1800s, they had practiced a viable trade, with graver in hand over an endgrain block, cutting illustrations for a healthy proportion of books, newspapers and periodicals. In the 1880s, they witnessed the advent of photomechanical printing plates and, in direct competition, felt the ominous rising tide of obsolescence. As this new technology became more efficient, less expensive and generally accepted over the next twenty years, commercial wood engravers would begin to pack up their blocks, wrap up their tools and seek other employment. It could well be this very occurrence that lay behind the discovery, 130 years on, of a collection of nineteenth century engraved boxwood blocks and, ultimately, the creation of this portfolio. Beautiful privately printed book featuring thirteen wood engravings from Samuel Smith Kilburn, Boston, George Matthews, Boston & Montreal F. Archibald. cloth-backed paper covered boards, paper cover and spine labels. N° de ref. del artículo 105925

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