REPORT ON THE SECTION OF GRAPHIC ARTS 

 IN THE U. S. NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1892. 



By S. R. Koehler, Curator. 



Repeating the words of my report for last year, it may be said that 

 the work done in the section of graphic arts during the fiscal year just 

 ended, does not show perceptibly in the appearance of the collections 

 exhibited. The aim has again been to make the several divisions more 

 complete by filling gaps here and there, and these additions are, as a 

 matter of course, lost in the mass to the general observer. From the 

 following details it will appear that the endeavor to complete the illus- 

 tration of the modern photo-mechanical processes has been continued, 

 while at. the same time due attention has been given to the other 

 departments, so tar as the means at command would allow. 



The most important additions of the year are the illustrations of the 

 halftone relief screen process and of a variety of the photo-aquatint 

 intaglio process (Photogravure Gilbo), prepared for the Museum at 

 reduced prices by Mr. M. Wolfe, of Dayton, Ohio, and Messrs. A. YV. 

 Elsou & Co., of Boston, Mass., respectively. Some interesting speci- 

 mens, illustrating the advances made in chromocollographic process 

 work, have been given by Mr. E. Bierstadt, of New York, and the J. B. 

 Lippincott Company, of Philadelphia. The collection of materials 

 used in the photo-mechanical processes has been increased by gifts 

 from Messrs. Jas. P. Smith & Co., of New York, and by purchase. A 

 beginning towards the illustration of the application of chromolitho- 

 graphy and of wood-cutting to the production of posters — a kind of 

 work which lias reached a high order of merit in the United States — 

 has been made by the gift of a few specimens by the A. S. Seer Theat- 

 rical Printing Company, of New York; the Courier Lithographing 

 Company, of Buffalo, N. Y., aud Messrs. W. J. Morgan & Co., of Cleve- 

 land, Ohio, and by the purchase of some of the tools used. The fol- 

 lowing additions to the illustrations of the history of the reproductive 

 arts have been made by purchase: Head ot Christ, P. 192, woodcut 

 after I Mirer; Portrait of Otto Heinrich von Schwarzenberg, woodcut, 

 dated 1607, by Chr. vau Sichem, after Goltzms; Christ before Annas, B 

 12, engraving on copper by Israel van Meckenem; Portrait of Philip 

 II, engraving on copper, dated 1586, by Ilieroiiymiis Wierix; Portrait 



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