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(b Holywood, County Down, Ireland, Jan 26, 1922).

Australian painter, printmaker, book designer, lecturer, collector, gallery director and publisher of limited edition artists’ books, of Irish decent. He worked as a draughtsman before entering war service in the British Admiralty from 1940 to 1949, including five years in Colombo, where he made sketching trips to jungle temples with the Buddhist monk and artist Manjsiro Thero. Between 1949 and 1951 Adams worked as an exhibition designer in London and studied wood-engraving with Gertrude Hermes in her evening class at the Central School of Arts and Crafts (now Central St Martin’s College of Art and Design). In 1951, after moving to Melbourne, Adams began a 30-year teaching commitment at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT), where he instructed many of the younger generation of Australian printmakers, including George Baldessin and Jan Senbergs. A brief return to Britain and Ireland in 1957–8 provided experience with Dolmen Press, Dublin, which published his first book of engravings, ...

[Baemler, JohannBemler, Hans]

(fl 1453–1504).

German illuminator and printer. He is listed in the Augsburg tax rolls from 1453 as a scribe and from 1477 as a printer. Bämler belonged to the guild of painters, glassmakers, woodcut-makers and goldbeaters, eventually achieving the rank of Zwollfer (director). Examples of his youthful work are two signed miniatures dated 1457 (New York, Pierpont Morgan Lib., MS. M.45) and a signed historiated initial on a detached Antiphonal leaf (Philadelphia, PA, Free Lib., Lewis M 67:3). Between 1466 and 1468 he rubricated and decorated with calligraphic and painted ornament four books printed in Strasbourg: a Latin Bible (Wolfenbüttel, Herzog August Bib., Bibel-S.2°155), a copy of Thomas Aquinas’s Summa theologica (Munich, Bayer Staatsbib., 2° Inc. s.a.1146a) and two copies of St Augustine’s City of God (Chantilly, Mus. Condé, XXII.D.11, and Manchester, John Rylands U. Lib., no. 3218, Inc. 3A8).

Bämler’s knowledge of printing was probably acquired in Augsburg, in the shop of ...

(b Sion Hill, Worcs, Jan 28, 1706; d Birmingham, Jan 8, 1775).

English printer and publisher . He developed skills in calligraphy and monumental inscription–cutting apparently without an apprenticeship. Aged 19 he went to Birmingham to teach writing and bookkeeping and also to cut tombstones. Around 1740 he entered into business as a manufacturer of japanned goods, at which he proved highly successful. The proceeds enabled him to purchase a large house outside Birmingham and to start experimenting with type-founding c. 1750. Baskerville entered into partnership with the London bookseller Robert Dodsley (1733–64), and he published an edition of the works of Virgil as his first book in 1757; it met with praise but also with the criticism that was to follow him throughout much of his career: the print was too dazzling, the strokes too narrow and the paper too glossy. Baskerville’s types achieved their effect by his modification of the stress nearer the vertical; the transition between thick and thin strokes was more pronounced than in previous types, and the general effect was of greater precision. He may not have set up his own paper mill, as has been suggested, but he certainly exploited the properties of the newly developed wove paper and pressed it to achieve a crisp finish (...

(b Bergamo, c. 1458; fl Venice, 1543).

Italian printer and publisher of books and prints. He settled in Venice c. 1480 and in 1483 was running a bookshop at the sign of St Jerome in the Merceria and published the Supplementum chronicarum of Jacobus Philippus Foresti (Bergomensis; 1434–1520). Between then and 1543, the year of the publication of Girolamo Savonarola’s Trattato dell’amor di Gesù, he published (alone or with other publishers) over 100 texts of Classical and contemporary authors, treatises on law and medicine, as well as several books of a religious nature, mostly in Latin. Among the most famous illustrated works are those of Dante Alighieri (1491) and Ovid (1493–4). After c. 1500 Benalio’s publishing activity declined (c. 40 post-1500 publications are known), perhaps pushed into second place by his new interest, the publication and marketing of prints. For this purpose he opened a branch at Padua, entrusting its management to a relative, ...

(b Dolni Dŭbnik, nr Pleven, July 24, 1901; d Sofia, Jan 23, 1958).

Bulgarian cartoonist, illustrator, draughtsman, painter, teacher, editor and critic. In 1926 he studied painting at the Academy of Art, Sofia, and although he was later known for his paintings, he achieved greater fame as a political and social cartoonist and newspaper and magazine illustrator. His early cartoons are courageous commentaries on political events in Bulgaria from 1925 to 1934, wittily satirizing the monarchy and dictatorships. He also mocked the machinations of the various bourgeois political parties as they fought for power. Among his most celebrated cartoons are the Kidnapping of the Constitution and the Tsar’s Family, published in the Sofia newspapers Zemedelsko Zname and Sturetz, as well as Suvremennik and other left-wing publications. He also illustrated the series Spanish Chronicle (1936). In 1940 he began freelancing for the anti-Fascist satirical newspaper Sturshel (Sofia) and in 1941 became its editor. During World War II he executed many political cartoons opposing Fascism and Nazism (e.g. ...

Family of Dutch engravers and publishers. Both Boetius Bolswert and Schelte Bolswert began their careers in Amsterdam but moved south c. 1617–18, working as book illustrators in Antwerp and Brussels and producing religious prints (e.g. the joint work on Saints of the Order of the Jesuits, Hollstein, p. 85, nos 278–82). The brothers are chiefly known for the excellence of their reproductions of paintings by Rubens, which they began to produce c. 1630.

Bolswert, Boetius [Boëthius] (Adamsz.) (à)

Bolswert, Schelte [Schelderic] (Adamsz.) (à)

(fl 1488; d Padua, Feb 1530).

Italian illuminator, printmaker and writer. He is first mentioned in Padua as an illuminator in 1488. He has been identified as the Benedetto Padovano who signed the Digestum novum (benedi[cti] patav[ini]) and the Decretals of Pope Gregory IX (be[nedicti] pa[tavini]), published by Jenson in Venice in 1477 and 1479 respectively (Gotha, Landesbib., Mon. Typ. 1477; Mon. Typ. 1479). Both incunabula were commissioned by the German book dealer Peter Ugelheimer, for whom Girolamo da Cremona also worked, probably shortly after 1483; the apparent dependence of Bordon’s style on Girolamo, particularly in his early works, may suggest that the Gotha incunabula were decorated after that date, during the years in which Bordon is documented in Padua. In the same period he probably also illuminated two folios (Munich, Staatl. Graph. Samml., 40198 and 40140), a Book of Hours (Vienna, Österreich. Nbib., Cod. 1970) and a Cistercian Breviary (Oxford, Bodleian Lib., MS. Canon. Lit. 343)....

(b 1854; d England, 1913).

English photographer, publisher and writer. He first travelled to Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) as private secretary to the Bishop of Colombo. In 1870 he set up a small bookshop in Colombo, which by 1884 had diversified into a flourishing publishing house, H. W. Cave & Company, and a printing firm equipped to produce books with excellent quality photographic reproductions. He took a serious interest in photography, and this enabled him to illustrate the pictorial travelogues written by him and published by his own firm. His close supervision of the details of book production and photographic reproduction gave him a competitive edge over other commercial photographers. He returned to England in 1886 after the death of his wife and settled down in Oxford. He made occasional visits to Ceylon, but continued to manage his firm’s business from England.

In his photography Cave specialized in rural and landscape scenes and was especially interested in creating views with luxuriant tropical vegetation, using dramatic atmospheric lighting effects. Some of the best examples of this type of work are reproduced in his lavishly printed travelogues ...

French family of publishers. Gervais Charpentier (d 14 July 1871) introduced to France a new format for books that allowed more words to be printed on the page, thereby making books much less expensive to produce. Although the format was originally called in-18 anglais, it was soon known in France as the format Charpentier. Charpentier’s publishing house produced, among other things, beautiful illustrated books, including Théophile Gautier’s Capitaine Fracasse (1863), with illustrations by Gustave Doré, and an edition of the works of Alfred de Musset illustrated by Alexandre Bida (1813–95). These achievements were continued by Gervais’s son Georges Charpentier (b Paris, 1846; d 1905). As well as publishing important novels by French Realist writers, Georges was responsible for such editions as Quatrelle’s A coups de fusil illustrated by Alphonse de Neuville. Georges Charpentier was awarded the Légion d’Honneur in 1886.

[Ch’en Chi-juzi Zhongshunhao Meigong, Meidaoren, Migong]

(b Huating, Jiangsu Province [modern Songjiang, Shanghai Municipality], 16 Dec 1558; d 19 Oct 1639). Chinese editor, writer, calligrapher and painter. He exemplified the literati ideal of the accomplished gentleman–scholar who rejected the sordid world of political involvement and devoted himself to a life of literary, artistic and philosophical pursuit. At the age of 28, having passed the prefectural examination, the first important step leading to a career in government office, Chen renounced official life in a dramatic gesture, by burning his Confucian cap and gown. Thereafter he lived at country retreats at Kunshan and then Mt She, near Huating in Jiangsu Province: entertaining guests; writing and editing; composing the poems, prefaces, epitaphs and biographies for which he was in constant demand; and travelling to places of scenic beauty in the company of friends.

Chen followed the lead of his close friend Dong Qichang, the foremost painter, calligrapher and connoisseur of the late Ming period (...

(b Portland, ME, March 4, 1832; d New York, March 26, 1920).

American painter, interior designer and writer. Colman grew up in New York, where his father, Samuel Colman, ran a successful publishing business. The family bookstore on Broadway, a popular meeting place for artists, offered Colman early introductions to such Hudson River school painters as Asher B(rown) Durand, with whom he is said to have studied briefly around 1850. Having won early recognition for his paintings of popular Hudson River school locations (see Storm King on the Hudson), he was elected an Associate of the National Academy of Design in New York in 1854. Most of Colman’s landscapes of the 1850s, for example Meadows and Wildflowers at Conway (1856; Poughkeepsie, NY, Vassar Coll., Frances Lehman Loeb A. Cent.), reveal the influence of the Hudson River school. An avid traveller, he embarked on his first European tour in 1860, visiting France, Italy, Switzerland and the more exotic locales of southern Spain and Morocco. His reputation was secured in the 1860s by his numerous paintings of romantic Spanish sites, notably the large ...

(b Kingston upon Hull, 1770; d London, 12 or March 14, 1812).

English publisher and engraver. He studied in London under Francesco Bartolozzi and engraved a number of book illustrations but was best known as a publisher, issuing the designs by William Blake for Robert Blair’s poem The Grave (London, 1743). In 1805 Cromek commissioned Blake to draw and engrave the designs, but Blake felt betrayed when Cromek engaged Luigi Schiavonetti instead because he saw that Blake’s style of engraving would not please the public (for further discussion see Blake, William). Blake was further annoyed when Cromek commissioned Thomas Stothard to paint the Canterbury Pilgrims (1806; London, Tate; for illustration see Stothard, Thomas), an idea that Blake thought had been stolen from him; in 1809 Blake published a very successful singly issued print of it. Bentley has shown that although Cromek had considerable understanding and sympathy for Blake his treatment of him helped to increase the artist’s isolation....

English music, book and fine art printers and publishers . In 1863 the Rev. John Curwen (1816–80), a congregational minister, established the Curwen Press in Plaistow, London with the aim of promulgating the Tonic Sol-fa method of teaching music. Under John Curwen, and after his death under his son John Spencer Curwen (1847–1916), the Curwen Press printed sheet music and texts on music education. By 1908 John Curwen’s grandson Harold Curwen (1885–?1965) had joined the firm and encouraged them to broaden their production to include high-quality limited edition books. Harold also created a lithography studio so that artists could produce book illustrations. In 1920 Oliver Simon (d 1956) joined the press as a typographer, later becoming a renowned book designer. His brother Herbert joined shortly after and together they held the posts of chairman and managing director respectively through the 1940s and 1950s. In ...

(fl Milan, 1430–6).

Italian painter and illuminator. He was one of a large family of painters and illuminators working in Milan in the 15th century. He appears frequently in the registers of the building works of the city’s cathedral and as a creditor of the influential Borromeo family. First recorded in 1430 as the painter of two altarpieces for the cathedral, he is mentioned again in 1433 and 1444 for the gilding of sculpture and in 1442, 1446 and 1448 for further paintings. None of these works survives.

In 1445 and 1446 Giovanni was paid by Vitaliano Borromeo for the illumination of family imprese. However, Cipriani has suggested that these payments were for a group of decorated diplomas (Milan, Trivulziana) granted to the Borromeo family in 1445, and on this basis says that the designs may be by the much better-known Master of the Vitae Imperatorum. A miniature of Filippo Maria Visconti in Galessio da Correggio’s ...

Medieval treatise and the most important source on the techniques of manuscript illumination (see Manual, manuscript). The manuscript (Naples, Bib. N., MS. XII.E.27) has no title or signature and was entitled De arte illuminandi by its first editor, Demetrio Salazaro. Containing recipes for the making, preparation and mixing of pigments and colorants, it is a simple and well-organized manual, clearly composed for teaching the illuminator’s craft. It describes consecutively the colours, gold, the temperas and various applications. Unlike most other medieval technical sources, De arte illuminandi is not a compilation of earlier treatises. The manuscript was probably written in southern Italy and dates from the end of the 14th century. No other copies of this text are known.

(b Veracruz, Mar 13, 1880; d Stamford, CT, Jan 10, 1961).

Mexican illustrator, writer, gallery owner, and publisher, active in the USA. He was the son of a wealthy Mexican lawyer and publisher. De Zayas started his career as an artist by providing drawings for his father’s newspaper in Veracruz. In 1906 he moved on to Mexico City’s leading newspaper, El Diario, but a year later, after the ascension of the dictator Porfirio Diaz, whom the newspaper had opposed, he fled to the USA. There he landed a position making caricatures for the New York Evening World. Shortly after his arrival in the USA, he came into contact with Alfred Stieglitz, who staged solo shows of De Zayas’s caricatures at his gallery Gallery 291 in 1909 and 1910, both of which proved to be huge popular successes.

In 1910 De Zayas traveled to Paris, where he stayed almost a year, scouting out adventurous forms of modern art for Stieglitz, notably the cubist work of Picasso and African sculpture. On his return, equipped with knowledge of European modern art and inspired by the work of the French modernist ...

(fl Leipzig, 1592; d after 1617).

German painter, illustrator and printmaker. In 1592 he was granted the freedom of Leipzig, where he worked mainly as an illustrator for the publisher Henning Gross. He specialized in views and plans of towns, including Moscow, Wrocław, Venice, Istanbul and Jerusalem. His etchings illustrated the Persianische Reise (Leipzig, 1609) by ...

(b Glasgow, April 20, 1707; d Edinburgh, June 2, 1776).

Scottish printer and educator. He was of humble origin, but determined to become a printer. In 1739 he went to Paris where he purchased fine and rare books that he sold in London for a profit. Two years later he had established a bookshop in Glasgow and began to print with such success that in 1743 he was appointed printer to the university. Foulis’s Iliad (1757) and Odyssey (1758) are among the finest examples of 18th-century typography. From 1751–3 he travelled in France and the Netherlands purchasing prints and over 350 paintings to provide the nucleus of the teaching collection of an academy of fine arts that he intended to establish in Glasgow on his return. The Foulis Academy (founded 1753) was housed in the university and financed by loans from Glasgow merchants. Tuition was free and the academy was the first to award scholarships for foreign study. It also held the first public art exhibition in ...

(b Hammelburg, Franconia, c. 1460; d Basle, Oct 27, 1527).

German humanist printer. He moved to Basle in 1491 and trained as a printer and scholarly editor in the Amerbach family workshop. After the death of Johannes Amerbach in 1513, Froben established himself as an independent publisher with a particular interest in the printing of Biblical and patristic works (notably a nine-volume edition of St Jerome), and engaged Hans Holbein the younger (see Holbein, Hans (the Younger)) and Urs Graf to design decorative initials and borders for his books; Holbein also painted his portrait (of which a copy is in Windsor Castle). Froben became a close friend of Desiderius Erasmus, who lived in Froben’s house, and was the publisher of Erasmus’s Greek New Testament (the first to be published). Froben also published tracts by Luther, but when Luther and Erasmus clashed over the doctrine of grace, Froben supported Erasmus. After Froben’s death the publishing house was managed by his descendants until ...

(b Mainz, c. 1400; d Paris, Oct 30, 1466).

German printer. He was a lawyer who in 1450 lent Johann Gutenberg 800 guilders to finance the publication of the 42-line Bible. He subsequently invested another 800 guilders and became Gutenberg’s partner. When Gutenberg became bankrupt in 1455, Fust assumed control of the press together with his son-in-law Peter Schöffer. On ...