Printing Colour 1700-1830 offers a broad-ranging examination of the rich period of invention, experimentation and creativity surrounding colour printing in Europe between two critically important developments, four-colour separation printing around 1710, and chromolithography around 1830. Its 28 field-defining contributions, by 26 leading experts, expand the corpus far beyond the beautiful, already well-studied images produced in European hubs like London and Paris. The chapters unveil the explosive growth in the production and marketing of colour prints at this pivotal moment. They address the numerous scientific and technological advances that fed the burgeoning popularity for such diverse colour-printed consumer goods as clothing, textiles, wallpapers, and ceramics. They recontextualise the rise in colour-printed paper currencies, book endpapers and typography, and ephemera, including lottery tickets and advertisements. This landmark volume launches colour printing of the long 18th century as an interdisciplinary field of study, opening new avenues for research across historical and scientific fields.
IntroductionMargaret Morgan Grasselli, Elizabeth Savage: Part I: Materials and Techniques Printing Colour in 18th-Century Europe Margaret Morgan Grasselli, Elizabeth Savage: Tools, Machines, and Presswork for Printing Colour in 18th-Century Europe Elizabeth Savage: Colour Printing Inks and Colour Inking in 18th-Century Europe Part II Relief Techniques: Letterpress, and Colour Woodcut Ad Stijnman: Colour Letterpress in Europe in the Long 18th Century Simon Turner: Elisha Kirkall and his Proposals for Printing in Chiaroscuro, Natural Colours and Tints, 1720-1740 Tico Seifert: Printing Chiaroscuro and Colour Woodcuts in Paris, Venice, and London c.1725-70 Sid Berger, Michèle Cloonan: Bringing Colour to Books and Objects with Decorated Paper in the Long 18th Century Rob Banham: Colour for Commerce: Letterpress-Printed Ephemera in Britain, 1700-1830 Part III Mezzotint and Trichromatic Printing Elizabeth Savage: The Politics of Process Mezzotint: Jacob Christoff Le Blon's Reputation, 1700-89 Dionysia Christoforou, Manon van der Mullen, Victor Gonzalez: From Colour Theory to Colour Practice: Printmakers in Pursuit of the Ideal Pigments in 18th-Century Europe Julia Nurse: Colouring the Body: Printed Colour in Medical Treatises during the Long Eighteenth Century Alice Nicoliello: Colour Printing in Late 18th-Century Italy: Édouard and Louis Dagoty, 1770-1800 Part IV Chalk, Pastel and Watercolour Manner, and Aquatint Margaret Morgan Grasselli: Printed Paintings and Engraved Drawings: Technical Innovations in Colour Printing in 18th-Century France Benedetta Spadaccini: Coloured Prints in Imitation of Old Master Drawings in 18th-Century Italy: Anton Maria Zanetti the Elder, Benigno Bossi, Francesco Rosaspina and their Contemporaries Rena Hoisington: François-Philippe Charpentier and the Development of Aquatint in France in the 1760s Chiara Palandri: A Voyage pittoresque in Norway through Colour Prints, 1789-c.1815 Corinne Le Bitouzé: The Market for Colour Prints in Paris at the End of the 18th Century Margaret Morgan Grasselli: Multiple-Plate Colour Prints and the Problems of Variant Impressions, Missing Plates, and Disappearing Inks Part V Stipple and a la Poupée David Alexander: English Colour-Printed Stipple Engravings, 1774-1800 Zalina Tetermazova: Between Painting and Graphic Arts: Colour Printmaking in Russia, 1750s-1800s Geert-Jan Janse: Anne Allen, Jean Pillement, and the Development of à la poupée Printing in France Karen Cook: The Contribution of à la poupée-inked Colour Printing to Natural History Illustration in France, 1800-1870 Part VI Consumer Goods and Expanding Markets for Colour Printing Ad Stijnman: Anatomy to Embroidery: Intaglio Colour-Printed Illustrations in European Books and Periodicals, 1700-1850 Susan Greene: Early Dye-Patterned Colour on Calico in Europe, 1600-1840 Phillippa Mapes: Printed Wallpaper in England in the Long Eighteenth Century Patricia Ferguson: Colour Printing on English Ceramics, 1751-70 Part VII Technical Experimentation and Industrialisation Michael Phillips: William Blake's Colour Printing: Methods & Materials Michael Twyman: Innovation and Tradition in Early 19th-Century Colour Printing Michael Twyman: The Beginnings of Commercial Colour Printing in Europe, 1835-1840
Dr Elizabeth Savage FSA FRHistS is Senior Lecturer in Book History and Communications, School of Advanced Study, and Head of Academic Research Engagement, Senate House Library, University of London. In 2020-22, she was an Honorary Fellow at Centre for the Study of the Book, Bodleian Libraries, Oxford University. In 2022-23, she was a Fellow at Linda Hall Library. Her research into pre-industrial European printing techniques, especially for colour, has won awards including the Schulman and Bullard Article Prize. Her latest book is Early Colour Printing: German Renaissance Woodcuts at the British Museum, and she co-edited Printing Colour 1400-1700. She regularly curates and contributes to exhibitions about print heritage, for example at the British Museum and Musée du Louvre. She teaches at London Rare Books School. Dr Margaret Morgan Grasselli worked for forty years at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, thirty as Curator of Old Master Drawings. Having retired in 2020, she then served as Visiting Lecturer in the department of History of Art and Architecture of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences at Harvard University (2020-2022) and Visiting Senior Scholar for Drawings at the Harvard Art Museums (2020-2023). An expert on French drawings, she is also an authority on French colour prints of the 18th century. She organised the 2003 exhibition at the National Gallery of Art, Colorful Impressions: The Printing Revolution in Eighteenth-Century France, and was the editor and primary author of the accompanying catalogue.
