Weekly Trinity journal., 1870-02-26
NUMBER s.
Chrome Picture Making,

Mark Twain has been to Boston, and here is
what be says of Prang's picture establishment:
| have been looking at Mr.. Prang's great
chrome establishment 1t ought to be called
the temple OF Patience. No American need ever
hope to become a successful chrome artist. Only
German patience and eyenuess of temperament
can endure such pains taking tediousness. One
month OF it would turn an American 5 hair gray
two months would make him bald, three would
strike him blind, four would drive him crazy
and five would kin him. Would you like to
try2
You have often seen Prang's chrome of a little
boy asleep in chair and cat surreptitiously
! helping herself to pudding in his lap-a pleas
ant little picture that grows on you and holds
you with its naturalness. 1t is all simplicity
there is nothing gaudy about it-and yet, each
of those small pictures goes through litho-
| graphic printng-press nineteen separate and
distinct times First, sheet of fine transparent
isingasS is laid on the original painting, and on
this the artist sketches in delicate outline the
prominent features of the picture, as children
copy engravings by help of the window glass.
The etching is in photographic ink, aud is easily
trans ierred to the smooth surface of block of
photographic stone by Il heavy pressure. Proofs
are printed from it for the use of the chrome
artist. On one stone he draws the groundwork
surrounding the boy and the cat, and this is
printed in faint pinkish tint On another
!
OF the cat. These are printed in a sort of mild
| leaden color On anot ther stone he draws again
| all that was drawn before, and adds a string
! hanging from the wall which is to support u
broom. This is printed in brown, for instance.
| lie draws portions of the boy on three or four
more stones, and adds the broom, the pot and
the bowl, leaving blank spots for the pudding,
! for the gloss on the hair, and the sheen where
! the light falls on the chds knee. When all
these stones are printed on shset, one on top
OF another, and all of different colors, you begin
to discern vague, shadowy resemblance to u
sleeping boy-ghostly spiritual, dreamy, uncer-
| tain. Some printed proofs show nothing but
two or three splotches of red scattered seem
ingly at random on the broad white suface.
In subsequent proofs they appear in their
proper places, aud become red division of
the boys ball. the cats tongue and so on.
Thus IL Is, patch upon patch, and smirch
upon smrch of color, the boy and his cat are
drawn and redrawn, printed aud reprinted
nineteen times, on a sheet of paper, till at last
the chaos of arms and legs, tails and paws, tnts
and splotches are barmoniously blended together
and the finished picture is before you. And
then, at distance of six feet, it is nice judge
that can tell IL from the original oil painting.
Chromos are printed from sixteen to twenty
six times, usually, according to the elaboration
that may be necessary. The finest and certainly
the most elaborate chrome yet issued 10 this
country is Mr.. Prang's latest-the Pompeiian
Mother" IA picture OF an elegantly dressed lady
of that damaged city, sitting in her chamber
with her child standing by her side. 1t required
Jortyteo separate printings TO complete this dainty
picture, and of course the artist had TO draw it
on torty-tw0 different stones. He remarked that
he was much interested in it till he had drawn
IT about twenty-seyen times, but towards the
last he began to get tired of it--he began to
banker after something fresh. lie say he can
blindfold himself now, and get drunk on nine
teen different kinds of liQuOr. and 90 deaf and
dumb and crazy, and stand on his head with one
arm in II sling aud the other tied behind bin,
aud draw that picture straight through aud
never miss line. | do not believe it. The cir
! cumstances would be against him. After the
picture had been printed in colors forty-two
times, the same artist had to draw it entire once
more on stone, aud engrape it, and then cut lines
across 1t and up and down, and every way to
represent the threads of the coarse canvas of an
oil painting aud the places where the colors in
an oil-painting stand out from the surface. The
finished picture is laid On this stone and run
through a steam-press that comes down upon it
with the weight of II couple of continents, aud
there is your picture with surface as rough as
tedious months of Shaving over the same picture
is at an end-for coat of varnish is all that Is
needed now to make the "Pompeiian Mother"
ready for the picture stores. Four months
ceaseless work repeating the same picture--am
not right in saying that no American need ever
hope to succeed chrome arlist2 Solomon
could not have said wiser thing, | do not care
how much he strained himself