The Black Hills union. [volume] (Rapid City, Pennington County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1889-1904, 1903-11-20
MAKING Fashion PLATES.
A Kind of Art That Supplies a Livin

A KIM of Art That Supplies a Livins
to Young Girl Artists.
New York Sun: A girl who paints wa
tercolor heads very well, but does not al
ways get orders for them, paints heads
for fashion plates in the intervals of wait
ing. 1t Is very easy and not uninterest-
ing. She works in one of the many estab-
lishments in New York where the maxi
ing of fashion plate pictures goes on,
those pictures Of the swishing skirts and
the delicate draperies that are scattered
broadcast over the country. This is bow
the work is done: A girl who is an ex-
cellent artist visits the openings, wher-
ever they are held. She carries with her
surreptitiously a little pad about the size
OF her palm and a pencil. She studies q
gown, takes out her pad and jots down
her notes of it before watchful eyes can
see her.
Or If the fates are propitious and no
body interferes she draws the entire gown
In miniature. Then she briggs 1t back to
the place of working, which is, as often
as not, the two parlors Of some DOWN
town boarding house. There she en-
larges the drawing. There are sometimes
other girls in the same room with her;
but oftener the girl who paints the heads
and this particular artist who does the
original sketch from the real gown sit in
the front room alone; as, being superior
artists, by rights they should. Then in
the next room gather the others, ten or a
dozen Of them, copying the first sketch.
One, nimble with her pen, inks in the
original drawing, another colors it, an
other paints in raised splotches which
when finished constitute the decoration
of the gown; another sketches in the
lace, while still another finishes out the
picture with a bit Of landscape calcu-
lated to give it atmosphere.
Then at the two windows kneel girls
who are busily engaged all day long in
tracing copies of the original drawn by
the girl in the front room. If the sun
shines, that is good; 1t brings the ines
out better Tor the eyes, but If the day is
gray the tracing is more difficult and
hard on the eyes. The arms, too, con-
stantly raised up to the light in the
drawing room, soon tire. But compared
with the drugery OF machine work it is
play. While the girl who paints the wa
%tercolor heads is at work at this place
she works only when orders are scarce,
and she must-all sketches are finished
in the second room without the head. No
profane HAND is allowed to approach the
task set apart for her. Figures are
sketched and painted in old rose, in
mauve and in blue, but no face adorns
them. That is left for the fingers Of the
genuine artist.
When the gown is quite finished, the
coloring laid on, the decorations touched
up with high lights, and the bit of land
scape added, then is the picture forward
ed to this girl who sits in a nook of her
own by the front window, where the
light Is best. painting heads, some with
dreamy eyes. blue, black and brown
some with sacy look, and some calm, as
BELTS the %splendor of the gowns to which
they are attached, but All very beautiful.
And the girl does it contentedly, too, for
she has learned sense. If this pedestal
Is not one Of the highest, she is set upon
1t. She is praised, and she has learned by
experience more or less bitter that it is
better to do work that is praised and paid
for, If it does seem to partalke Of the ev-
eryday work of the workaday world, than
to sit in her Studio and starve.