![The Ferry [The Cambridgeshire Ferry]](4.jpg)
The Ferry [The Cambridgeshire Ferry]. 1880. Etching in brown ink on paper; 6 1/8 x 10 7/8 inches (15.5 x 27.3 cm) – image size. [Click on the image to enlarge it.]
Generally Macbeth's etchings of his own works followed the finished painting but in this particular case the etching preceded it. The etching was commissioned by Philip Gilbert Hamerton, the editor of The Portfolio, and published there in 1881 opposite page 21. The Portfolio described it as follows: "The scene of the etching is a Cambridgeshire ferry with gipsies and gleaners crossing together. Mr. Macbeth has a picture of the same subject in progress, which will probably be exhibited at the Royal Academy this year. The time of day chosen for the picture is towards sunset, with long shadows falling on part of the figures and the landscape."
The etching was subsequently reprinted in A Score of Etchings, with text by Roger Riordan, and published by Dodd, Mead & Co. in 1883. Riordan's comments on this print are very informative. Looking at his general approach, and his methods, Riordan explained:
This etching is in the nature of a study for a picture or has been done from such a study. All of Mr. Macbeth's etchings, it appears, have some reference to his paintings. Occasionally he jots down his first impression on the copper, before trying any other medium; at times he works from a crayon sketch or the first state of his picture upon the canvas; at other times he copies minutely the finished painting. His etchings of the latter class have been blamed for overfinish. They are said to be laborious and minute, with the fullness of a carefully finished drawing, but none of the liberty of a sketch.... His more sketchy work, like that in the present example, is generally held to be his best.
Riordan particularly admired what might well be termed the Idyllic qualities of the etching:
This is a truly English piece of work. One can imagine the piled-up clouds, like solid light; the trees, the houses and portion of the bank massed with them, the group of gleaners on the raft to the right making part of the great mass of light that almost fills the picture. On the other hand, there are only thin and transparent shadows, lying on the bank to the left, on the water and across the lower half of the figures of the gypsies who, with their horse and dog, are crossing at the same time. It is thoroughly in the spirit of the old English school the introduction of the incident of the gypsy man tuning his fiddle. There is to be music all the way across. The two groups are very well contrasted – the harvesters weary and glad of the rest; the wanderers all alive and amusing themselves. Even the two dogs belong to two different states of society. For the moment, the nomads are of more consequence than ordinary working people. The others have their regards fixed on them. The ferryman at the windlass is attentive to the scraping of the fiddle.
In the case of this particular etching it was based on a pencil drawing, which is currently in a private Canadian collection.
Links to Related Material
- Later version in oil, with further commentary
- Nineteenth-Century Engraving, Wood Engraving, Etching, Lithography, and other forms of Printmaking
Bibliography
“The Ferry. Etched by Robert W. Macbeth.” The Portfolio XII (1881): 21.
Riordan, Roger. A Score of Etchings: With Text. New York: Dodd, Mead & Co. 1883.
Created 1 June 2023