DOI Artikel:
Macfall, Haldane: Joseph Simpson: Caricaturist
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.20712#0040
A Caricaturist
AN ENGLISH POET BY JOSEPH SIMPSON
accomplishment was ot no mean order may be
judged by the fact that the walls of the Royal
Scottish Academy and of the Royal Society of
Painters in Water-Colours had displayed his works.
But in the province of painting, Fortune, that
comes down to men in a shower of gold, did not
attend him. Thus it came about that the book-
plate drew him to a new field of artistic endeavour.
In black-and-white he now achieved considerable
success, his work appearing at the Munich Inter-
national, at the National Arts Club in New York,
and various exhibitions at Berlin, Copenhagen,
Antwerp. But fine as was his work in bookplates,
on bookcovers, and in posters, it was, odd to say,
after seven years in the desert of neglect that, in
in the realm of caricature, he first made his public
hit. A year ago there appeared the weekly paper
known as “ London Opinion,” and it was in the
pages of this journal that, after one or two sue.
cesses in a provincial Edinburgh paper called
“ The Student,” he essayed the role of caricaturist,
and at once leaped to the front as one of the
foremost creators of caricature in this country. To
“London Opinion” his caricatures brought its
chief title to distinction, and the numbers in which
his masterly work appeared soon began to be
sought after by the collector.
In caricature there are to-day several men
of some talent: one of the most biting that
England has ever known being Max Beerbohm,
master of the acid stinging line; one of the
most whimsical and comical, F. Carruthers
Gould, master of the political situation; one of
the funniest, E. T. Reed, master of the ridicu-
AN ENGLISH NOVELIST BY JOSEPH SIMPSON
lous. But there is no living caricaturist who can
approach Joseph Simpson in decorative sense,
in massing and arrangement, or for beauty of
artistry. The rich rhythmic sense of line, the
resounding effect of his deep blacks, the informing
and suggestive pose, the almost Holbeinesque
balance of the portrait, the technical fitness of the
line employed to state the peculiarities of the
personality portrayed — these qualities are not
to be surpassed by any living caricaturist. It
was inevitable that the realm of caricature
should eventually evolve the artist — but it is
strange that it is not until black-and-white is
almost in its death-throes that we have the arrival
of the caricaturist who is first of all the artist—but,
though the art of illustration is to-day threatened
by, nay, perhaps dying under the heel of, the
photographer, it is little likely that the caricaturist
AN ENGLISH POET BY JOSEPH SIMPSON
accomplishment was ot no mean order may be
judged by the fact that the walls of the Royal
Scottish Academy and of the Royal Society of
Painters in Water-Colours had displayed his works.
But in the province of painting, Fortune, that
comes down to men in a shower of gold, did not
attend him. Thus it came about that the book-
plate drew him to a new field of artistic endeavour.
In black-and-white he now achieved considerable
success, his work appearing at the Munich Inter-
national, at the National Arts Club in New York,
and various exhibitions at Berlin, Copenhagen,
Antwerp. But fine as was his work in bookplates,
on bookcovers, and in posters, it was, odd to say,
after seven years in the desert of neglect that, in
in the realm of caricature, he first made his public
hit. A year ago there appeared the weekly paper
known as “ London Opinion,” and it was in the
pages of this journal that, after one or two sue.
cesses in a provincial Edinburgh paper called
“ The Student,” he essayed the role of caricaturist,
and at once leaped to the front as one of the
foremost creators of caricature in this country. To
“London Opinion” his caricatures brought its
chief title to distinction, and the numbers in which
his masterly work appeared soon began to be
sought after by the collector.
In caricature there are to-day several men
of some talent: one of the most biting that
England has ever known being Max Beerbohm,
master of the acid stinging line; one of the
most whimsical and comical, F. Carruthers
Gould, master of the political situation; one of
the funniest, E. T. Reed, master of the ridicu-
AN ENGLISH NOVELIST BY JOSEPH SIMPSON
lous. But there is no living caricaturist who can
approach Joseph Simpson in decorative sense,
in massing and arrangement, or for beauty of
artistry. The rich rhythmic sense of line, the
resounding effect of his deep blacks, the informing
and suggestive pose, the almost Holbeinesque
balance of the portrait, the technical fitness of the
line employed to state the peculiarities of the
personality portrayed — these qualities are not
to be surpassed by any living caricaturist. It
was inevitable that the realm of caricature
should eventually evolve the artist — but it is
strange that it is not until black-and-white is
almost in its death-throes that we have the arrival
of the caricaturist who is first of all the artist—but,
though the art of illustration is to-day threatened
by, nay, perhaps dying under the heel of, the
photographer, it is little likely that the caricaturist