100 Years of Illustration

Henry McCarter in Letreis, Brittany, 1898

Henry McCarter illustrated this article in Scribner's Monthly Magazine for April 1898, written by an older colleague Cecilia Waern, who lived from 1853 until 1926.If you Google her name it will help if you can also read one of the Scandinavian languages since she was published on both sides of the Atlantic. Click on the images to enlarge them.

Scribner's ran this full page illustraton of McCarter's in the same issue. It indicates that it was done in Paris in 1896 and has little in common with the Breton travel story by Ms. Waern. I'll include it since it suggests an Easter theme with an indigenous artist of the period trudging along on his own Via Dolorosa.

This would make a wonderful painting. A pity it was probably done in monochrome to be reproduced only in black-and-white.

Breton Woman. A splendid portrait by McCarter even if it might have been drawn from a photo.

A full page layout.

Another full page. No question in my mind that these were based on photos.

This is the most lively illustration in the piece.

Detail of the illustration.

A really nice scenic. McCarter knew how to put together an illustration. We're so used to seeing color printing today that it's difficult to appreciate how good these pages were for the year 1898.

Henry McCarter's Scenes from Early Irish History

Additional material added 8 March 2008 here at the top and two pieces at the bottom.

This is dedicated to a dear old friend, painter and teacher Robert Emmet Grady, who departed this life in August 2005 at the grand age of 91.
The last time I saw him he was in his mid-eighties, chopping wood and doing 45 push-ups each day when he wasn't playing the Irish pipes, painting and print-making.

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In time for Saint Patrick's Day I've uploaded Henry McCarter's Scenes from the Early History of Ireland, published in Scribner's Monthly Magazine for December 1906, with explanatory notes by noted Irish scholar Douglas Hyde (1860-1949) who served as president of Ireland from 1938 to 1945.

Henry McCarter was born 5 July 1886 in Philadelphia, and died 20 November 1942 in Norristown, Pennsylvania. He studied with Pierre Puvis de Chavannes, Leon Bonnat, and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec in Paris; and with Thomas Eakins at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts.

Click on these images to enlarge them. I hope you can read the text as well. Perhaps a magnifying glass will help. I'm having success with a Bausch & Lomb 4-inch (cm. 10) magnifier.

The first page of the article.

Detail of illustration only.

Detail of illustration only.

The narrative is then interrupted by these facing pages.

Narrative continues.

End page.

I'm sorry to say that all I have of this piece are these two illustrations. It's by noted Irish nationalist author Alice L. Milligan, from Harper's Monthly Magazine for January 1901 and it was reproduced in gray tones. More's the pity.