History of Printed Illustration and Woodcuts: Brianne Burraston, Annotated Bibliography

I started my bibliography with a general search in the library related to printing, unsure of what I first wanted to research. My search on printing lead me to section ZE on the fifth floor of the library where I found a plethora of material on the printing press. I opened a book and flipped through the pages to find a subject that interested me. However, due to the obscurity and specificity of the subject, I had difficulty creating a bibliography. Thus, I decided to go back to the shelves and browse and came across illustrations and woodcuts. This caught my attention and inspired this bibliography.




1. Chappel, Warren, A Short History of the Printed Word, The New York Times 1970 (Found through browsing the shelves at the HBLL)

• This author discusses the origins and techniques of printing from medieval times through the twentieth century. Focusing on his chapters regarding wood cuts, he discusses the history of wood cuts and the impact wood cut illustrations had for artists and social status, and the economic benefits of wood cuts. He provides background on how wood cuts were made in the sixteenth century and also discusses how illustrated books changed the emphasis to the art rather than the text. 

2. Goldschmidt, Earnst Ph. The Printed Book of the Renaissance, Cambridge University Press, 1950 (Found through browsing the shelves at the HBLL)

• This book goes through the history of print illustration beginning with the medieval era, where non-print illustration originated. It traces the history of illustration prints and how they increased their efficiency with the woodcuts. He discusses how woodcut printing was practical knowledge acquired through technical experience and how this intentionally limited the use of wood cuts until artists and printers began to sell them to other cities and countries and it became a large economic business.

3. Lewis, John, Anatomy of Printing, Watson-Guptil Publications, 1970  (found through online HBLL search)

• In Chapter 4: "The reformation and the printing press: artists take an interest in the printed illustration," Lewis discusses some of the unexpected benefits of the printed illustration. For example, the printing press accelerated ideas not only through words, but through illustrations. He discusses the social benefit of illustrations that allowed the illiterate to understand ideas through pictures. He also addresses the economic benefit to printers of using the same illustration for multiple works. 

4. Morrison, Stanley and Jackson, Holbrook. A Brief Survey of Printing History and Practice, New York, 1923 (found through browsing the shelves at the HBLL)

•  This source offers a brief history of woodcutting and illustrations in the sixteenth century Europe. He discusses the use of the printer's trade-mark as an illustration used to distinguish works and continues to discuss the evolution of the technology regarding printing and illustrations through the mid-twentieth century.

   5.  Gascoigne, Bamber. How to Identify Prints : A Complete Guide to Manual and Mechanical Processes from Woodcut to Ink Jet (found with through online Google Scholar search, then searched and found on HBLL webpage, and then read in person in the HBLL)

• This book gives a thorough history of the printed illustration while covering the technical vocabulary. It details the print illustration techniques used throughout the years. The illustrations in the book itself aid the reader in understanding a more technical understanding of the history and process of the printed illustration. Wood cuts were at their peak use in the sixteenth century, declined, and then began to be used again in the eighteenth century when a more efficient technique was developed.

6.  Cole, Richard G. "The Use of Reformation Woodcuts by Sixteenth-Century Printers as a Mediator Between The Elite and Popular Culture", Journal of Popular Culture, Bell and Howell Information and Learning Company, 2000 (Found online through google search and HBLL search, then read in person)

• This article offers sociological insight into how woodcutting and illustration affected social roles in society. It discusses various insights into how the printer of the sixteenth century served as a mediator between the elite and popular culture through using both " early modern" and early folklore images in their prints.

7.Eichenberg, Fritz, The art of the print: masterpieces, history, techniques, Harry. N. Abrams, Incorprorated, 1976 (found through bibliography of How to Identify Prints then read in person)

• This book details the world history of print and illustration from early Chinese prints to modern day. He discusses the simplicity of the wood cutting technique and how its popularity spread. He then details the specific technique of early wood cut artists complete with illustrations of their works.

Challenges and Insights:
I ran into a few difficulties while doing this bibliography. Most of the sources I found were published from 1950 to 1970 and did NOT have bibliographies. Also, There was one book I really wanted to read that I found listed on the HBLL website. However, it was checked out. A disadvantage of print is oftentimes there is only one copy available and thus only one person can utilize it at a time. However, a nearly unlimited amount of people can look at this post I just wrote at the same time. The internet makes published information–ie scanned books–much more accessible and accommodates everyone that wants to read a source and has the internet and permission to utilize the book online.
I struggled with finding my journal source from an online source due to the massive amount of irrelevant results I had to sort through. I learned that I need to be specific when it comes to narrowing down and finding relevant sources. However, in the end I found a journal source that was particularly interesting and added a new perspective to my bibliography.

This experience reminded me that going to the physical library gives us the opportunity to browse physical books. I enjoy browsing and find it more valuable than using the Internet. The books are sorted by subject, which makes it convenient to pick up a relevant book that you might have not found on an internet search. Also, the bibliographies are quite useful for finding other references. Oftentimes these references are on the same shelf, as was my experience. I found most of my sources through looking at a shelf, picking a book that looked interesting, and scanning the pages for my topic or looking at the table of contexts/index.
 The presentation today brought up how browsing is being destroyed by the Internet. We lose a part of the research and pleasurable reading experience if we lose the physical book. . . I appreciated this opportunity to utilize the resources we have at the library and to learn more about an unfamiliar subject.
Below I have posted some interesting facts I learned while researching:

Interesting Facts I learned while researching: 
These are my notes from the books/journal I read that people might find interesting.

I believe this is a woodcut from Edelstein

• 1. Less emphasis on the printed word with the creation of block-books. Block books consisted of pictures AND words cut into a single piece of wood. Made printing more efficient/more economical. Simple in text (believed to be post-Gutenberg) 
• Edelstein was the first illustrated book printed in Bamberg in 1461 woodcut illustrations w with separate impression. 
• 1st Printed translation of Martin Luther's Translation of NT w/ illustrations printed in 1522
• Background on how Woodcut is made (91) Tools and preparation of the woodcut in sixteenth century

• Illustrated books where the art illustrates a part of the text originates from the medieval era. Wood cutting, first done by Mansion in 1484 in Ovide Moralisé, was the best technique found to create printed illustrations that harmonized with printed type. (see illustration below.) Copper engravings were first used. However, these produced faint illustrations that did not compare to the defined black of the printed type. 
• "None of the hundreds of Classics printed at Rome, Venice, or Milan have any illustrations. Not a single classic Latin text before 1493 contains any woodcut or engraved illustrations"(37)
• Task of illustrations difficult and kept secret. No books on how to do it, but skill handed down through apprenticeship. Earliest printers of illustrations in all the world were from Germany or regions belonging to Duke of Burgundy" 



Woodcut from Ovide Moralisé + added illustration

• had to acquire "practical knowledge" of the art.. all had a common background of technical experience. 
• Illustrated book intended to help the illiterate (50)
• People wanted books for the illustrations, not only for the text
• Made the artist more important in society. .
• First illustrated prints woodcuts NOT w/ typography... problem w/ it lining up and registering w/ printed surface. Difficulty of creating exact height of woodblock so that illustration aligned perfectly and would transfer onto the page. Blocks instead inked paper laid on top of them and  "and impression" taken by brushing the back..

• Obvious benefit of woodcut illustrations is that it could be used for printing multiple books. ie you can use the same illustrations in different books
• Germany's awakening against ecclesiastical corruption.. printing press accelerated ideas not only through words but through illustrations.. "clarified ideas for the literate and were the source of ideas for those who could not read"
• Dürer history--famous for wide distribution of engravings and woodcuts