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1204 .. T H E LEADER. [No. 299, Saturday...
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Tt»*.L_. n-fifpiv JL-tlxlfllivFw ¦
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..«-nntti1t.iPtfT"ii!itor3 but tb.e tude...
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Which is the cheapest newspaper in the w...
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Victor Cousin has resumed his sketches o...
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Goldsmith has been a fortune to our pain...
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. . THE DECORATIVE ARTS. Handbook of the...
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Transcript
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
1204 .. T H E Leader. [No. 299, Saturday...
1204 .. T H E LEADER . [ No . 299 , Saturday , ^^^^ M ^ MBWI ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ 4 ¦
Tt»*.L_. N-Fifpiv Jl-Tlxlfllivfw ¦
Kiktnmn .
..«-Nntti1t.Iptft"Ii!Itor3 But Tb.E Tude...
.. « -nntti 1 t . iPtfT"ii ! itor 3 but tb . e tude'es and police of literature . They do not CritaC 8 r £ ke * ' ws-lh 1 £ totSfcSrtand try to enibr ' ce them—Mdinburgh Bevieu ,.
Which Is The Cheapest Newspaper In The W...
Which is the cheapest newspaper in the world ? Bold as it may seem to answer such a question without a warehouse of newspapers carefully sorted , by way of evidence , we thin k & priori the distinction may be awarded to the Volks-Zeitung , published afc Berlin . This organ fur Jedermann aus dem Volke is a daily paper which costs about three-halfpence a week ! It is a very decent looking journal tco , quite equal in appearance to most other German papers , well printed on a quarto sheet , with occasional supplements of an extra sheet . It cont ains a leading article , the telegraphic despatches the Berlin news , with brief accounts of what is stirring in London , Paris , Switzerland , and America , and th e " Markets . " Generally it contains an article of popular science . Cheap as this paper is , it is cot inferior to the mass o German papers y to many it is superior . That such a paper could be established in so small a town as Berlin , and be niade to pay the proprietors , may give our speculators matter for thought . Three-halfpence a week for a daily paper !
Victor Cousin Has Resumed His Sketches O...
Victor Cousin has resumed his sketches of celebrated Frenchwomen during the 17 th century . To Madame de Longxjevillk and Madame de Sable he now proposes to add La Duchesse De Chevrecse and Madame de Haute fort . In the last number of Xa Revue des Deux Mondes appears the first part of his animated story of the life and adventures of Madame de Chkvreuse , to which all lovers of anecdotieal history and all lovers of romance are recommended . That queer kind of compliment , so often passed on a history , "It reads like a novel , " may assuredly be passed on this chapter of the history of France . We should ^ be glad if novels always read
like it . In the same number of the Revue there is an article on Kingsley ' s " Westward Ho I" by M . Emile Montegtjt , who watches our literature with a careful eye , and keeps his countrymen informed on whatever is likely to interest them . Gustavk Planche takes a retrospect of the year ' s productions at the Theatre Fravcais , in bis accustcmed style of trenchant selfsufficiency . Planche is certainly one of those whom Gresset call les vilfransdelafaluite—one of those " Qui decide , qui fronde
Parle bien do lui-meine , et rnal de tout le monde . He has an adroit way of paying himself a compliment in every other sentence . His slightest opinion is une offirmation ; and he is careful to tell you that tons les esprits dtlicats will at once see the justice of what he is about to say . It is only in France such a writer could be tolerated . In France they secretly respect such colossal confidence , such absolute decision . They are not themselves given to pedantry ; but , however they may laugh at it , they have a certain awe of what Molikke so finely
calls" Tout le savoir obscur do la pedanterie . " ( Savoir obscur is very happy . ) Hence they have not dared to " put down " Gustave Planche , who for . a quarter of a century has been flourishing the pedagogic ferule as if it were a sceptre .
Goldsmith Has Been A Fortune To Our Pain...
Goldsmith has been a fortune to our painters . They cannot leave him alone . Every year the walls of the Academy show us a scene from the " Vicar of "Wakefield , " or an episode in Goldy ' s own life- Mr . Birket Foster has this Christmas taken up the " Traveller , " determined on making it a gem among the gift-books . He has profusely illustrated the poem in his happiest manner j and the publishers have done their part with the " getting up . " We are not sure that they have not overdone their part . The book seems to us even too splendid : on the drawing-room table it will lie an ornament which our fingers scarcely dare approach ungloved , for fear of soiling its gilding . However , when once that qualm of conscience is allayed , and the volume lies . open , the visitor will not shut it until he has looked through all Mr . Birket Foster ' s illustrations .
. . The Decorative Arts. Handbook Of The...
. . THE DECORATIVE ARTS . Handbook of the Arts of the Middle Ages , and Renaissance , as applied to the Decoration of Fvrmtwe , Arms , Jetvel ; frc > From the French of M . Juloa Labarto John Murray M . Labartb has broutrht a fine taste and extensive learning to the illustration of a neglected subject . His work , though originally intended only as the introduction to a catalogue , has long been known and prized by artists and antiquaries throughout Europe . The translator , therefore , has performed n very useful task , especially as he has procured for this edition the
orig inal woodcuts , in the possession of M . Labnrte . The delineations of antique enamels , embossed goblets , Moorish arabesques , Saracen swords , and Etrurian vaBes had been executed too lovingly to bo repeated to perfection by a copyist . It is seldom that , in books of this character , wo find the text to correspond , in clearness and elaboration , with the engravings ; but M . LabartQ ' n manual is virtually the medieeval history of ornamental sculpture , painting , meta ) -work , and pottery—the history , indeed , of refined luxury . Tho-1 illustrations are remarkably varied , representing every form of eccletiMtictl furniture , of arms and armour , of crowns , thrones , and jewels , of cameo * , goblets , vases , urns , and ewers—even clocks and saddles . Thus has art , in the ages of its highest development , passed from sacred and palatial Architecture and monumental sculpture mul painting into tho recesses of social
life , and made Pictures of tables spread for social use . The Greek waterjar , over which we hang a veil of glass , stood in the Athenian ' s courtyard ; it was worthy to stand by his wine-goblet or his funeral urn . In our own days a Revival is promised . The artist is employed by the manufacturer . M . Labarte ' s work appears opportunely to promote this' Renaissance . It is rich in examples of exquisite design , in suggestions and practical explanations —of high interest to the student , and of obvious value to the designer-The first part is occupied by the history of ornamental sculpture during the Mediaeval and Renaissance periods . The works of the Grthie and Lombard king 3 , the carved thrones and chairs of wood and irory , the reliefs on church walls , the diptychs of the consuls—appropriated by the priests—the portable altar-pieces and sacred vessels wrought upon the the transition from to Christian ^^ — — — — m * * v *« * " *
surface into pictures—displayed a Pagan a form . Albert Durer , Nicolas and John Of Pisa , Agostino , Agnolo , Orgagna , Donatello , and Ghiberti are the great names of the Revival , as it influenced carving and decorative sculpture . Some of their works had all the breadth and grandeur of monumental art ; others were marvels of minute elaboration . In Germany and France carvings were produced which contained within the space of an inch twenty figures , admirable in attitude and expression . In another form this ingenuity was carried so far , that a specimen of Mediaeval painting exists , in which a bird , drawn on the corner of a leaf , is so small that it can only be seen thoroughly through a microscope , yet so perfect , that the eye is full of life and observation . The Renaissance fostered a style of picturesque decoration , covering walls , balustrades , furniture , and festal services with traceries , scrolls , arabesques , owers , and fruit .
M . Labarte describes successively the progress of decorative paintingon walls , windows , manuscripts—in embroidery and in mosaic . It was a daring impulse that excited the mosaic artist to rival the painter in oil—to produce cartoons instead of pavements , by means of bits of marble , or glass , endlessly diversified colours . The Greeks introduced into their mosaics many new processes , and added an effect of astonishing brilliance by laying the cubes of glass on a ground of gold and silver . In the sixteenth century this singular art , encouraged by the Venetian Senate , and by Titian , who gloried in all colour , continued to flourish ; but painting , under the influence of the great masters , became incomparable , and mosaic , for a time , disappeared : ¦—In restricting mosaic to tbe imitation of painting , the artists were obliged to improve its mechanical processes ; instead of the little stone 3 and the cubes of glass of which it had been formerly composed , they now employed coloured enamels , reduced to strips of various forms and sizes , the different shades of which , have been estimated at ten thousand . By means of these enamels they were able
to produce every colour , to emulate every half tint , and to represent every transition and degradation of tone . Possessed of such powerful resources , mosaic , towards the end of the XVIIth century , was wonderfully restored to favour , and brought to great perfection . It was then employed to render an important service to art in the reproduction , in more durable materials , of the masterpieces of tlie great painters . The popes , by causing the finest paintings of tbe Vatican to be copied in rnosaic for tbe churchof St . Peter , bave secured their immortality . * In works of small size , mosaic has succeeded in treating with inconceivable minuteness , landscapes , buildings , and even portraits , and is enabled to render with tbe truth of painting , skies , water , foliage , aud even the lightness of the hair of animals . M . Labarte ' s chapters on Da mascene work , and on enamel , abound in curious detail . There were two kinds of Damascene work—the incrustation of one metal on another , and the inlay of a brighter in a dull metal . Of enamels there were three descriptions—the painted , the translucid , and tbe
incrusted : — Towards the middle of the XVth century , painting in enamel had made great progress , and with tbe specimens before us we are enabled to explain tbe processes employed in making them . On an unpolished plate of copper , the cnameller traced with a style the outline of the figure or subject to be represented . The plate was then overlaid with , a thin tranBlucid flux , after wliicb tbe eaaineller began to apply his colours . Tbe outlines of tbe drawing traced by the style wore first covered over with a dark-coloured enamel , which was to give the outline upon tbe surface of the picture ; the draperies , tho aky , tho back-grounds and accessories , wore then expressed by enamel colours in tolerably thick layers , which enclosed tbe
filling up the interstices formed by the dark-coloured outline different euamel colours , performing as it were the same office as tbe linos of metal in the process of incrusted enamels . There was therefore a total absence of ¦ badow in tins painting , in which the first design was expressed by thickness of colour * . The space for the flesh tiutB was filled with a black or deep violet enamel ; they were then rendered upon this ground by white enamel applied in layers more or less thin , in order to preserve tho shadows , and thereby obtain » sketch very lightly in relief , of the principal bony and musoular parts of the face and the body ; consequently , all tbe oarnatious in this process havo a biatre or violet hue by which they may easily be recognised . shadows
In order to produce effect in the rest of the painting in which tho ( were entirely wanting , the light parts of the hair , of tho draperies and back-ground , were , most frequently , indicated by touches of gold . The imitations of precious stones applied upon the mantles of tho saints and upon the draperies , nro poouliar to this description of euamels , which aro generally painted upon flat plates of oopper , rather thick , and ooatod with a thick enamel at tho back , presenting a vitreous appearance . A taste was prevalent during tho Middle Ages for the works , original and imitated , of ancient lapidaries—vaaes of rock crystal , dr inking vessels ot agate , cups of sardonyx and lapis-lazuli , richly mounted and engraved . M . Labarte describes , also , the wonderful progress of tho goldsmith ' s craftperfected in Italy , and degraded in France . Perhaps , liowever , the most interesting portion of his summary is devoted to the Keramic art—to Greek and Etruscan pottery , to the varnished and enamelled wares of Spain and Italy—the jars of the Alhambra , the painted majolica of Florence , Faenssa . and Urbino—the works of Palissy and his pupils , and tho Flemish and German schools . The history of ornamental glass , starting from tho imitation of onyx-cameo in the Portland vase , is traced through the period of the Lower Empire to the establishment of the Venetian manufactories In the golden book of Murano nine names of glass-makers appear . This * GhlrlAndoJo UHd to « wy that roosAta was the . only pni =. tlng for eternity . —V « w » ri JAf * of Clhirtandqto .
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Dec. 15, 1855, page 16, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_15121855/page/16/
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