Biography of the engravers of the eighteenth century

The engraving of portraits and landscapes

The general public who is interested in the history of the engraving sometimes forges himself/itself a classification a little summary. In his/her/its thought, in France, the XVIIIe century is the reign of the engraving of kind, small picture of m.urs or pleasing or light; the portraiture characterizes the times of Louis XIII and Louis XIV, and the taste of the landscape only appears has the romantic time. But, has tighten the question besides near, the curious perceive quickly that neither the representation of the human person nor the one of the nature is not absent of the .uvres engraved of the XVllle century. On the contrary, they can note that they have the part of the lion there.
Portraits and landscapes include the common feature to be taken in the reality. Neither don't leave armed quite, I want to say entirely, of the artist's brain. Here, as her, secondary is the role of the imagination; it is only about feeling, to understand deeply and to translate with the biggest possible penetration.

That the painters of portraits and landscapes are held to conform to this double law, no one there contradicted. But, one will say, the engravers and especially the engravers of translation have for unique to owe to copy with accurateness.
No, the engraving is not a simple process of reproduction; the engraving the engraving is an art, an art to the best sense of the word; the engraving enjoys the privilege to increase without lessening; besides, it is an universal language that each knows how to hear; it is a tribune of or the artist has faculty to speak has all the civilized universe.
It was never more obvious than in the XVIIle century. It is necessary to remember, and this evidence, and the whole précellence of the art of the engraving, to understand the role of the French engraving of this time, his/her/its importance and his/her/its obstinate triumph, that it was about games of the imagination or representations of the reality.

A priori, there is indeed, in this extraordinary success, something paradoxical: the original engravers were rare in the XVIIle century; most masters of the burin and the tip limited their ambition to translate the .uvres of others. But there is manner to translate. One admits that to engrave his/her/its own compositions, it is, on the one hand, to assign has its impressions a lasting value or prove their depth and, of the other, to make a little this public confession of which speaks Pascal, to spread in broad daylight his/her/its manner to see and to feel, his/her/its ideas, his/her/its preferences, his/her/its dreams. One doesn't wonder that, for a real artist, to reproduce a portrait or a landscape paints, it is to penetrate the painter's soul, to understand it and to show that it has been understood. A translation can remove all accent has the original, but it can add as there, witness the compliment makes by The Brown has Gérard Audran: "You embellish my paintings"; it is not still an interpretation of second degree, it is as often an interpretation has the second power. Such was the art of the engravers of the XVIIle century. 

To consider their engravings under the only aspect of the technique, one notes that their efforts stretched has reproduction, more and more faithful, the burst, the coloration and the one thousand nuances of a painting. This movement will succeed, toward the thin extreme of the reign of Louis XV, has the adoption of the system of the engraving in color, when this invention that dates the first left from the century, will have been perfected by the successive discoveries of the" manner of pencil" and (1758) the" manner of washing (1766)." But, between 1700 and 1750 about, it is solely by games of sizes and against-sizes, by miscellanies of points and features, by deteriorations of shades and lights, that the Lords of the copper pretended to translate all tones of a palette.

This preoccupation of collorisme was at home so quick that it influenced on the evolution of the various kinds of engraving. The success of the transposition was relatively easier concerning portraits that concerning landscapes; also success was it the fast and complete, here slow and ever all made reaches. These two categories of engravings underwent, of the rest, of the different influences that activated of it or delayed progress. It is why, in spite of all common features that permit to unite them in only one whole, and although often the same artist, as for example Baléchou, also triumphed in the landscape and in the portrait, engravings of portraits and engravings of landscapes must be studied separately. 

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