Aquatint. 



45 



admixture of roulette work and other elements of the process of crayon- 

 engraving. 



One of the earliest and most successful followers of Le Prince, 

 Fran9ois Janinet (Paris ; 1752-1813), also frequently combined roulette 

 work with aquatint. He was the first to introduce the printing of 

 aquatints in colour, achieving clear effects by the use of a large number 

 of plates for the different colours. But he was not so good an artist as 

 P. L. Debueourt (Paris; 1755-1832), a master of society genre, who 

 was equally successful as a colour-printer, and purer in the use of 

 aquatint. 



Other Frenchmen worthy of notice are C. M. Descourtis (1753- 

 1826), P. M. Alix (Paris ; worked about 1790-1817), and A. F. Sergent- 

 Mareeau (Chartres, Paris, Nice; 1751-1847), the last two being chiefly 

 of interest for their portraits. 



Good reproductions of wash drawings, for which the transparent 

 quality of aquatint was so perfectly fitted, were done in Germany in 

 the late XVIIIth century by J. G. Prestel and his wife, Maria 

 Catharina Prestel, the latter working after 1786 in London. The 

 process was introduced into England by the water-colour painter, Paul 

 Sandby (1725-1809), who used it in several series of views from 

 1775 onwards. He appears to have been the first to use the spirit- 

 ground, and to have christened the process Aquatinta. The earliest 

 French aquatinters more often used the title gravure au lavis. Sandby 

 was followed by many of the other water-colour artists, who found this 

 process of great practical use in the drawing-books so popular at this 

 period. Apart from the drawing-books the most important work was 

 done by Thomas Malton, the younger (Dublin, London; 1748-1804), 

 Thomas Daniell (1749-1840) and William Daniell (1769-1837). A 

 large number of less interestmg aquatinters were kept employed by 

 Eudolf Ackermann, who published many books with illustrations after 

 Eowlandson and others between about 1808-34. The earliest plate of 

 Turner's Liber Studiorum was etched in aquatint by F. C. Lewis 

 (1779-1856), but Turner was apparently dissatisfied with the result, and 

 thereafter kept entirely to mezzotint, which is so much richer in its 

 quality ; but aquatint is often found on the Liber plates in conjunction 

 with mezzotint, to express the more transparent tones of sky, etc. 



By far the greatest artist to make constant use of the process is the 

 Spanish satirist and painter, Francisco Goya (Fuente de Todos, 

 Saragossa, Eome, Madrid, Bordeaux ; 1746-1828). His earliest plates 

 are in pure etching, but practically all his finest works, e.g. the 

 Cajprichos, the Desastres de la Guerra, the Pi'overbios, and the Tauro- 

 mdquia are in aquatint. No etcher has shown a more perfect command 

 of the subtle quality and variety of tone to be achieved by aquatint. 



Aquatint, and allied methods such as sand-grain, or sulphur-tint, are 

 frequently used by modern etchers, but there are no other names, until 

 these living artists, which call for special mention. 



