USA > Illinois > Cook County > Chicago > The Congress of Women : held in the Woman's building, World's Columbian exposition, Chicago, U.S.A., 1893 : with portraits, biographies and addresses > Part 90
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What are the essential qualities of etching, which form its essence and differen- tiate it from other mediums?
First of all, it is born of line; line is by its nature suggestive and not imitative, it deals with selection and omission, not with elaboration and subtle tones. In all arts reserve is strength; selection presupposes knowledge; and tact in omission is the refinement of understanding. The limitations, then, which forbid to etching a diffuse mode of expression add to its power by concentration, and elevate it to the level of poetry by giving to it a measured form, and it becomes to art what the sonnet is to literature."
"Etchers can not rely on an attractive exterior to cover up paucity of thought;
Miss Blanche Dillaye is a native of Syracuse, N. Y. Her parents were Hon. Stephen D. Dillaye (French descent) and Charlotte B. Malcolm (Scotch descent). She was educated at Miss Bonney's and Miss Dillaye's School for young ladies (now Ogontz School), and has traveled in Enrope, England, France, Holland, Italy and Germany. Miss Dillaye is director of the art edncation received at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia. Her specialty is etching ; she has exhib- ited in all the large cities of England and at the French Salon, Paris. She was one of the women who contributed to the exhibition of the women etchers of America (exhibiting forty etchings), held at Boston in 1888, and afterward in New York in the same year. She was chairman on etchings for the State of Pennsylvania on the Woman's Anxiliary of the Board of Lady Managers for the Columbian Exposition, 1893. Her postoffice address is No. 1430 Sonth Pennsylvania Square, Phila- delphia, Pa.
*The following is a brief synopsis of the paper read by Miss Dillaye, followed by the author's notes, showing the man- ner in which the subject was treated .
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flowery additions and superfluous methods they leave to other mediums. They should come at once to the vital truth; they should select the essentials and leave the nones- sentials to them; there should be no joy in appearing to do a simple thing in a difficult way; they should prefer simplicity always, for in this simplicity lies the sublimity of their art.
"Large and elaborate plates should be shunned by the painter-etcher, for he can not for months, while his plate is going through stages of undue finish, 'feel vividly some overmastering thought;' nor can he be possessed by 'the heat of a passionate inspiration' while he plods over an unwieldy copper plate and laboriously draws straight lines to fill up numberless square inches of bituminous shadow. Passion does not work that way; it has an ancient and old-time preference for spontaneity.
" It was discovered one day that etching stood as a stamp of culture, and all those who love to masquerade in giant's robes sought to wrap themselves in its ample folds. Etching was taken up by fashion, commerce discovered its golden uses; the demand for etching was instituted and the artist succumbed.
"Step by step the art that has stood the test of the ages, the art of Rembrandt and Claude, abandoned its birthright. One engraver's tool after another crept in, and mechanism took the place of art. The line that once swayed to an impulse began to labor unceasingly with tones and semitones, the spirit and passion took flight, and its noble simplicity, its spontanicty, freedom and strength, its purity, suggestiveness and emphasis were blurred and lost in a verbosity of line. It ceased to be autographic; it became photographic.
" There will always be those to whom it will be a chosen art, a few original minds who find in it an appealing something that other mediums lack. To these it must ever remain dear, and among the many who have plied the needle there will be the survival of the fittest, those who have been true to it, those who have never degraded it, those who have preserved it in its integrity. In their hands it rests to carry it over this period of apparent failure, and when it shall have revived, a century hence if it must be so, it will be its true self that will rise, the mean garbs that have clothed it of late will be stripped from it, and it will shine forth in the simplicity and beauty with which it is endowed by those characteristics which are its prerogative."
Process :- Definition of etching; definition of biting; plates employed in etching (illustrated); ground employed in etching (illustrated); needles and tools used in etching (illustrated); manner of lay- ing the ground; mordant or bath used; slow acid; quick acid; individuality or temperament of etcher shown in his manner of biting; methods of several eminent etchers.
Principal Processes-Stopping-out process, in use by etchers of old disadvantages. Continuous process; advantages. The result of underbiting; the result of overbiting.
Etching Proper-Dry point, its charm (illustrated); the burr defined (illustrated); effect in print- ing (illustrated); effect when removed.
The Printing-Proofs, how taken; plaster proof (illustrated); states of the plate (illustrated); trial proofs (illustrated); retroussage (illustrated).
The Remarque-Its original significance, its history, its perversion.
Etchers Classified-The painter etcher; the reproductive etcher; the engraver etcher.
History : Early beginnings-Armor and war implements engraved in Archaic times; engrav- ing known to Goldsmith before it was used in printing. Twelfth century, letters found bitten into steel. Fifteenth century, a receipt found for a "water which hollows out iron;" earliest dry points; early claimants; Germany gives us the Hopfers, a family of etchers; 1515, Albert Dürer, etcher. Sixteenth century pervaded by commercial spirit. Seventeenth century, etching revives and advances; in Hol- land, Rembrandt, Van Dyke, Rubens; in France, Claude Lorraine. Eighteenth century, a time of exhaustion. Nineteenth century, great revival, French influence, publishers, writers; English influence, Seymour Haden, Whistler, Hammerton; America, a powerful school arises; New York Etch- ing Club organized; Philadelphia Society of Etchers; early exhibitions.
Value :- Essential qualities of etching, suggestive not imitative; its limitations, its beauties, individuality, range, emphasis, directness; the necessity of thought; the necessity of significant line; the necessity of personality ; the necessity of spontaniety; unfavorable influences; demands of the public; demands of the publisher; demand of the artist necessity. .
Result :- Abandons its true qualities; engravers' tools creep in; exhaustion follows, the art wains; survival of the fittest; revival in the future.
COMPENSATION. By MRS. ALICE ASBURY ABBOTT.
As the time draws near when the curtain shall roll down upon this extraordinary drama of the exposition of the economic and æsthetic forces of the world, those who have known the history of the unusual difficulties confronting women are tempted to run up the story and look forward to some hoped-for compensation.
There are always people of loftiest impulses and purest ideals (occasionally they are illogical in their radicalism) who have little patience with the tread-mill course of human progress, who do not take kindly to the study of social economics, and who in practice, though not perhaps in theory, deny the scientific principle of emulation unless they can see the wheels go round. Such people hold there was no use for a woman's building, and none whatever for a special exhibit through an independent representa- tion, or in any sort of fashion. True, the interests of men and women are indivisible as a race, but they do not stand upon the same plane in respect to their opportunities, their social, legal and political rights. As an actual fact, the position she occupies, unarmed and defenseless, is at present that of:
" Let her get who has the power, Let her keep who can.'
The standard-bearers of the cause of women of an earlier period found it hard to recognize the conditions which now confront us. It is so difficult to adjust one's self to the life where the radicalism of yesterday has become the conservatism of today. Never in the history of the world has a radical principle become an accomplished fact until, after having served its purpose as an educator, it expresses the conservative sen- timents of the mass.
There are social theorists and sound administrators of justice who insist that the way to repeal a bad law is to enforce it. There are people who would make war odious by carrying on war until conditions become so intolerable that all nations being waste and humanity rendered delirious by suffering, men should declare that peace must reign because the land is desolate and the very air heavy with the lament of the living for the dead. At the critical period when the opportunity for place and influ- ence is to be seized, or at that sublime moment when public opinion is to be molded into tangible form, the statesmen, the politician and the man of affairs waste no time in reflections upon ideal theories.
Human nature being the same in man and woman, whatever difference there may be being the result of environment, success is never attained except through the rec- ognition of one inexorable law of social and political economy. Expediency is the lever which has always finally forced the cause of human rights, and expediency will carry the advance all along the line. Not until it is proved that infraction of the great unwritten code of justice is detrimental to the true interests of the body politic has any vantage-ground been obtained by the individual sufferer. The appreciation of oppor- tunity is the very genius of reform. When that opportunity is seized there may be frantic outcries of protest, ludicrous and sometimes malicious criticism and indignant howls from those who are compelled to keep up with the procession, but it is all futile. The inevitable logical result of the imperious demand of existing conditions carries the standard along the highway of progress, to be planted on the next vantage-ground,
Mrs. Alice Asbury Abbott is a native of Illinois. Her parents were Kentuckians. Her father, Heury Asbury, was a lawyer well known in Illinois during the past fifty years. She was educated in Quincy, Ill., and in Germany. She has trav- eled in Europe and America. She married Abial Ralph Abbott, a lawyer of Chicago, who was born in New York and was a graduate of Amherst. Her principal literary works are translations from the German, magazine and newspaper articles. Mrs Abbott's postoffice address is No. 353 East Fourth Street, Chicago, Ill.
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and presently along come the laggards round the corner, grateful, though breathless, to find the flag flying after all.
Now this was exactly the position of this queer thing called the woman question in connection with representation at the Fair. The rapid development of women has pro- duced among them the beginning of the close study of the social economic condition of society. No building was necessary to prove that woman is an essential factor in the economic world; that because she is such it behooved loyal citizens, anxious to carry out intelligently the opportunity afforded by governmental recognition, to see to it that a more accurate knowledge of her share of this labor be obtained and daily honored. The time having come when woman is entering every known field of action, she who is forcing her way to the front in the ideal arts, in the learned pro- fessions and in all those lines emphasizing individual progress, should wake up to the disabilities surrounding the women workers of that vast army, whose daily bread is earned under conditions disastrous to that personal development and prosperity which she, the more fortunate, is conquering for herself.
A skeleton exhibit of the work of woman, where she has been or remains a com- plete artisan, was deemed the most valuable upon which to base knowledge and future organization for the amelioration of the social economic condition. Supplementing this by the exhibition of the enormous work of women throughout the departments, the relative value of the artisan and the human part of a great machine, such as the average workman has now become, is a matter of grave study.
The man or woman who hopes to amend or ameliorate cruel conditions along the material side alone is undermining the foundations of good government, as well as assuring the demoralization of the race. On the other hand, the idealist who would neglect the improvement of the material interests of the individual who would not first aid the attainment of the comforts of the physical nature, is doing much to crush out that respect for the sacredness of human life, without which any lofty standard of personal responsibility and personal purity is absolutely impossible. Consequently, while the board of managers was, undoubtedly, mainly intended to stand before the world for a representation of women, as an economic factor of society, this is not the entire extent of its obligation.
Until there are national boards of labor and a more perfect system of census returns in every country of the globe, the light which statistics logically arranged bring to bear upon the study of social science will in a measure be unattainable. In the present condition of industrial competition an unauthorized, because not govern- mental, demand for statistical information as to numbers, wages, social condition and the consequent deduction of the result of all three, would be received with jealousy, distrust and absolute mendacity on the part of the employer.
It is well that art and architecture have done so much for the Fair grounds. If it were not for the lovely exteriors and enchanting landscapes, the tremendous force of the materialism expressed by the exhibits would oppress beyond belief. To the multitude there is but one building, and that the Woman's, which stands for an idea. They may not formulate this into a thought, they may not voice the sentiment, but this truth carries them along in its intangible vortex. Whether the motive be curiosity, intelli- gent conception of the spirit prompting its erection, or a vital interest in the woman question, they all come. There is not an official, foreign or native-born, who has not desired audience of the president of the board; there is not a keen-eyed politician, though he may be somewhat antagonistic if he has studied logic, who is ignorant of the value of the building and the additional weight given the claims of woman by its existence. There is nothing like an object lesson to impress the popular mind with the importance of a growing idea. Occasionally, along comes some superficial observer who pronounces the whole thing a failure; he does not condescend to inform in what it is a failure, but he has no conception of its real purpose. All criticism is of value as it argues interest. It is only the inconsequent things which escape comment, ridicule, sarcasm. Caricatures are never brought to bear upon individuals or official
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bodies unless the principle which they represent is of considerable moment to the general public.
A permanent Woman's Building could not stand for a nobler or more practical aim, as one of its grand functions, than as the headquarters of a great system of state and international councils devoted to the temperate study of the condition of the women workers of the world. How long. would it be before this vast educative influ- ence would result in striking from the statute book of every state in this Union laws inimical to the interests of women. How long would it be before the limitation of the hours of labor for both men and women would be a possible and constitutional enact- ment sustained by the consensus of public opinion, without which no law can become public practice. How long before the question of child labor, with all its attendant complications of compulsory education and manual training schools would receive active attention of legislators and rouse the supine interest of the mere sentimental theorist.
Truly there is the noblest, the most inspiring result to be anticipated if the women are now equal to the next step in human progress, made possible by the vantage ground they now occupy. If they neglect it or supply it, it may be twenty-five years before we regain the position. We are continually exhorted nowadays to be prepared for dangerous and wondrous changes to be wrought in the condition of society in the near future. It is one of the most curious fads of the time, this role of the Jeremiah of the economic system, and is a very convenient form of an attempt to shake off all present sense of personal responsibility for evils around, possibly in our power to alleviate. It is the role of the hopeless pessimist. Suppose it is the bad quarter of an hour. It is then the time for action. It is always the bad quarter of an hour, and has been from the beginning of time to those who recognize the necessity of reform of present evils. There always comes a time when education has performed its work and an advance in civil and ethical progress becomes a feasible attainment.
We are also told nowadays that the danger, should women attain actual political influence, is their tendency to introduce the ethics of the family with the ethics of the state; that it is the nature of women to confer benefits in proportion to the lack of merit of the recipient- that is, the more worthless the citizen the more she will do for him. A sort of application of the maternal instinct to care most assiduously for the worst of her children. This is not a special feminine weakness, but simply the impulse of sentimental misdirected and uneducated energy in both men and women. It arises from confounding that wise degree of care which the state must bestow upon its help- less, unfortunate or depraved classes with the injudicious use of governmental pro- tection and beneficience which becomes absolutely detrimental to the development and usefulness of the citizen by its paternal character.
Manual labor is not all the vital work of the world, though sentimental audiences clap their soft hands at the reiterated enunciation of this proposition on the part of professional agitators. While as a practical matter it is but a small proportion of humanity which does not daily do some share of manual labor, slight though it some- times may be; it is a preposterous proposition that actual pliysical exertion, to the extent of earning a subsistence, is the inherent obligation of each member of the human family. What a world of barbarians we would be! There are limitations to human endurance, though the brainwork which does so tremendous a share in the advance- ment of civilization is as exhausting labor as that of the purely physical. The only difference is that, as a general result, we find the physical laborer working under humane surroundings is granted a longer lease of life.
This deification of manual labor by half educated theorists is based upon crude notions of shortening hours by division. The uncertainty in the public mind, in that condition of society where intelligence is not general, as to the character of the obli- gation of government in this respect, is another reason for the false reasoning we meet so often. Hence, we find the attempt to revive the era of the complete artisan in an age when the spindle, the loom and the marvels of steam and iron fingers have all
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combined to make the human being the mechanical addition to the plant, by confining him to the manufacture of certain parts only of the complete product; with the fur- ther result also of shortening the hours of labor, and, except under specially adverse circumstances, of increasing the amount of his wages.
The exhibits in the Woman's Building show most conclusively that, at the present day, it is only in those countries where the masses have not yet attained a high plane of education, and where the general condition of the industrial classes is the most deplorable in point of wages, and consequently comfort attained, that the complete artisan is to be found of either sex. The main object of exhibiting the work of the complete artisan in this place is to show if there may yet remain a place where these trades can be carried on with profit and under conditions neither antagonistic to sound' economic law nor injurious to human life. If antagonistic to present economic condi- tions it is childish to attempt their revival. Some of these trades, indeed most of them, may be of the class of luxuries for which there is but a limited demand, and wisc women would desire to limit and diversify rather than to increase the number in such avocation. If, however, this class of display is in the ideal arts where machinery and steam may never become a rival, it is safe to compete in the open market. It then becomes the highest purpose and noblest individuality of expression, combined with the capture of opportunity which wins a livelihood, fame or fortunc.
While striving for a loftier conception of the dignity of labor, which may be con- sidered one of the ideal uses of the Woman's Building, it would fail utterly of its purpose if it did not rouse women to that knowledge of conditions which should make them clasp hands with the many toilers pleading for shorter hours and that legislation which will insure protection for life and limb and secure sound sanitary conditions.
We hear much of a demand for a higher education for women nowadays. There is not in all this building one material thing which indicates any advance along any lines where the higher education of women in its scholastic sense touches or has pro- duced it, unless it may be through inference in the organization room, or where the application of scientific knowledge in the care of the sick or the maimed has made the art of nursing a profession.
There is small use of the higher education if its sole use is to enable women to devote themselves to the learned or scientific professions, leaving out its noblest pur- pose the application of the science of government and economics to the correction of the miseries of mankind. The mightiest lever in society, next to the relentless giant necessity, is sympathy, and for that noblest, most ennobling attribute of the human race, this building stands today, and through this subtle influence its permanent suc- cessor will for the future accomplish its mission, as one more step along the highway of human progress."
WOMAN'S AWAKENMENT. By MRS. ANNA S. GREEN.
Never before in the history of the world has the capacity of woman been more recognized than now.
It is her era of promise, a vivid reflection of exaltation, dis- closing that period when the Angel of the Lord appeared and made known to Mary the purpose of our Heavenly Father, choosing her as the mother of His Son, the Saviour of the world, that through her His immaculate birth has to be humanized. Woman will not, if true to herself and mission, fail to remem- ber and ponder upon and hold fast to the vantage ground, gained for her by this Divine choice, strength- ening her claims as relative co-operator with man, his well-wisher, co-worker and helpmate. With rever- ential awe, down the annals of time, this mighty truth will be echoed in utterances of thankfulness and joy, praising Him ever for the priceless part He has given to woman, which can not be taken away.
We, as descendants and representatives of that woman whom the whole universe praises and blesses, should endeavor to emulate her holy, virtuous life as maiden, wife, mother and friend. Through love, she accomplishes much. By love, was this great incarna- tion wrought, and through woman's love; which in- centive influence will, with reaching heart and hands, MRS. ANNA S. GREEN. with softened tones, reclaim the callous, cold and wicked, from the extremes to which their morbid state consigns them. History, mod- ern and ancient, is replete with examples of what good women have done. Guided by this inherited, instinctive, practiced gift of charity, she has been enabled to over- come great evils. Monica, the mother of the Christian patriot and Penitent Augus- tine, taught him from his earliest youth the great tenets of love, forgiveness, penitence and confession. Augustine's life was full of pathetic temptations and sorrow for sin, but in his greatest trials, the mother's influence and example rescued him from fatal fall; that mother's love which shone as a beacon to call him back; and from having been a great sinner he became a great saint. The legacy of prayer he has left to the world will go down to future generations as a solace, a plea, a hope for mankind.
Blanche, of Castile, and the mother of Godfrey of Cologne, trained their sons, the great crusaders, for their heroic work. Joan of Arc, through love of country and kind, from the simple peasant maiden was transformed into the leader of the trained vet- erans of France, who followed her to victory. Letitia, the mother of the dictator of Europe, known only in history as " Madame Mère," proved how the simple title of mother could be made great and glorious.
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