Eye Witness: Artists and Visual Documentation in Britain 1770-1830"In Eye Witness, Sam Smiles examines the role of graphic arts in recording information about aspects of the social or material world. He discusses the claims of some artists and publishers of this period that their images offered a form of knowledge equal, or even superior to, written descriptions. A variety of projects are considered, ranging from medical and antiquarian texts, to costume studies and investigations of contemporary labour. Individual books are discussed in the light of the publisher's declared intentions and the contemporary critical reception. Sam Smiles also investigates the distinctions drawn between illustration and other forms of artistic production, with special consideration given to the work of J. M. W. Turner."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved |
Contents
The testimony of the eyes | 13 |
art and information | 47 |
costume books and social understanding | 77 |
Copyright | |
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accuracy accurate activity aesthetic anatomical Ancient antiquarian Antiquities artists Britain British Art Busby Cambridge University Library cognition collection coloured aquatint concerned contemporary context costume books Cries of London critical depiction display drawings Edward eighteenth century England English especially evidence example exhibited Farington figures genre George Gothic architecture Gough ibid illustrated images industrial J.M.W. Turner J.T. Smith James James Basire John Britton John Carter knowledge labour labouring-class landscape letterpress Liber Studiorum mediaeval Microcosm Middle Ages military monuments Museum Britannicum Nenia Britannica object observation occupations organization painter painting Paul Sandby picture Picturesque Representation plates portrait presentation prints produced publications published Pyne's reader Review Richard Gough Richmondshire Royal Academy scene seen social Specimens St Mawes staffage studies subjects surveys Syndics of Cambridge systematic Tate Gallery taxonomic Thomas topographical understanding University Press W.H. Pyne watercolour Whitaker William William Smellie World in Miniature