New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1868-01-19

skilful olass-and is preparing to move
into larger building at Roxbury. He
uses eighteen presses; and his sales
are enormous. His catalogue now
embraces large number of album
cards-about seventy sets, of twelve
in each set; beautiful series of illu-
minated Beatitudes" and " Scriptu-
raj Notices :" an endless list Of our
great men, and Of men not so great
after all of juveniles, notably, pro-
fusely illustrated edition of "Old |
Mother Hubbard;" and of half chro
mos and chromos proper. TAFT
Chickens" Ducklings," and
:. Ouails" we're the first chromos that
met an instant and wide recognition.
Nineteen thousand copies of the
..Chickens" alone were sold. Bricher's
early autumn on Esopus Greek" is
one of the best chrOmos ever made on
small scale. The Bulfinch'' and
the . Linnet" (after Cruikshank) are
admirable. There are other chromos
which are less successful, and one or
two that are not successful at all but
they are nearly all excellent copies OF
the originals, with which the defects
must be charged.
The chromos of Bricher's paintings
are really wonderfully accurate,
Mr.. Prang's masterpiece, however,
isnot yet published, although it snear-
ly ready for the market. 1t entirely
surpasses all his previous efforts. 1t
is Correggio's "MAGDALLsA,' and can
hardly fail, we think, to command
quick sale and hearty recognition.
Like every modern discovery, chro-
-lithography has its partisans and
detractors-those who claim for itper-
haps impossible capabilities, and those
who regard it as a mere handicraft,
which no skill can ever elevate into
the dignity of an art. We do not care
to enter into these disputes, Wheth-
er an art or handicraft, chromo-lith-
graphy certainly re-produces charm
ing little pictures vastly superior to
any eolored plates that we have had
before and it is, at least, clearly en-
titled to be regarded as means of ed
ueating the popular taste, and thereby
raising the national ideal Of art.
A correspondent, looking at cnromos
from this point Of view, thus indicates
lit may be somewhat enthusiastically
their possible influence on the culture
Of the people;
"What the discovery of the art Of
printing did for the mental growth of
the people, the art Of chrome -litho-
graphy seems destined to accomplish
for their aesthetic culture. Before
types were first made,s eholars and the
weather. classes had ample opportu-
mites for study; for even when Bibles
were chained in churches, and copies
of the Scriptures (then aptly SO styled
were worth herd of cattle, there were
large libraries accessible to the arts
tOcracy of rank and mind. But they
were guarded against the masses by
the double doors Of privilege and ig
norance. A book possessed no at
fractions for the man who could
not read the alphabet; and, be-
cause they we're rare and hard
to get at, he had no Indictment tC
master their mysteries. Made cheap
) and common the meanest peasant, in
the course of few generations, found
solace for his griefs in the pages Of
the greatest authors of his time and Of
all time. Mental culture became pos
sible for whole nations; and democ-
racy with its illimitable blessings
gradually grew up under the little
/ shadow of the first printers proof.
: "Until within quite recent period
: art has been feudal in its associations
Galleries ofpriceless paintings indeed
! there have always been in certain ia
vored cities and countries; but to the
people as a whole they have beer
equally inaccessible and unapprecia.
+ ted, because no previous training haC
taught the community how to prize
3 them. 1t was like Harvard college
without the district SCHOOL, planet
a without satellites, and too far removed
{ from the world Of the people for iii
a light to shine in the cottage and in th'
!, homes of the masses.
a "Now, chrome lithography, althougl
: still in its infancy, promises to diffus,
d not love of art merely among tn
c people at large, but to disseminate tn
choicest masterpieces of art itself. ]
y is art republicanized and naturalize
:, in America. Its attempts hithert
= have been comparatively unambihous
: but it was not Honer and Plato iato 4 ina
we're first hoEored by the printinI
|, press. II was dreary catechisms Q
= dreary creeds. So win it be with thi
I new art, As the popular taste i'm
\ proves, the subjects viii be worthy {
! an art which seeks to give back I
a mankind what has hitherto been cor
i fined to the few"