purveyors of popular
pictures to a frivolous or sentimental public. This estimate was
unfortunately true enough in most cases, true enough at least to cause
the practice to be regarded with suspicion. As an indication of how
things have changed in recent years we can say that color is no longer
the exception. It threatens, in fact, to become the rule, and
black-and-white now fights a retreating battle. A comparison of any
large exhibition today with one of even 20 years ago will make this
plain.

[Footnote 1: The purist's attitude was pungently expressed by
Whistler. Pennell records this remark: "Black ink on white paper
was good enough for Rembrandt; it ought to be good enough for
you." (Joseph Pennell, _The Graphic Arts_, Chicago, 1921, p.
178.)]

At first glance Jackson seems to be simply a belated 18th-century worker
in the chiaroscuro process. If to later generations his prints had a
rather odd look, this was to be expected. Native qualities, even a
certain crudeness, were expected from the English who lacked advantages
of training and tradition. And Jackson was not only the first English
artist who worked in woodcut chiaroscuro, he was virtually the first
woodblock artist in England to rise beyond anonymity[2] (Elisha Kirkall,
as we shall see, cannot positively be identified as a wood engraver) and
he was the only one of note until Thomas Bewick arose to prominence
about 1780. He was, then, England's first outstanding woodcutter. We
will find other instances of his significance from the English
standpoint, but his being English, of course, would have a small part in
explaining the importance of his prints.

[Footnote 2: The only earlier name is that of George Edwards.
Oxford University has most of the blocks for a decorated alphabet
he engraved on end-grain wood for Dr. Fell in 1674. Further data
on Edwards can be found in Harry Carter's _Wolvercote Mill_,
Oxford, 1957, pp. 14, 15, 20, and in Moxon's _Mechanick Exercises,
or the Doctrine of Handy Works Applied to the Art of Printing_.
(Reprint of 1st ed., 1683, edited and annotated by Herbert Davis
and Harry Carter, Oxford, 1958, p. 26n.)]

Jackson made, in fact, the biggest break in the traditions of the
woodcut since the 16th century. He broadened the scope of the
chiaroscuro print and launched the color woodcut as a distinct art form
that rivaled the polychrome effects of painting while retaining a
char