Wilbur Macey Stone

By W.G. BOWDOIN

THE book-plate designers of to-day are legion because they are many. Almost every one who can draw, and many who cannot, have ventured into the field of book-plate designing; and the result has been that many of the book-plates that are current have little to commend them to critical observers. The present increasing interest in these little bits of the graver’s art has greatly encouraged the production of them, and new ones arise daily. It is desirable, therefore, if we are to have book-plates at all, that they shall be as artistic as may be; and it is important, from an art standpoint, to all those who are about to adopt the use of these marks of ownership that they shall have, as they may have, the artistic flavor about them.

Most of our leading designers have hitherto been grouped in the eastern section of our country, or at least not much further west than Chicago. Some few designs, it is true, have been produced in California, but for the most part the book-plates of note have been marked with an eastern geographical origin.

In William Edgar Fisher we have a designer who has strikingly departed from geographical conditions of book-plate designing heretofore prevailing, and in faraway Fargo, North Dakota, has set up his studio from whence have come designs that are fresh, original and very pleasing. Mr. Fisher loves to work in a pictorial field. He makes a plate that tells a story, and in his best plates there is artfully placed something bookish that harmonizes with the design-form selected; and, because of art coherence and harmony in design that go hand in hand, his plates are more than satisfactory. The general eastern notion in regard to North Dakota is that nothing artistic can come out of the State, but the work done there by Mr. Fisher quickly dispels such an idea. The plates he has drawn are acknowledged as highly meritorious by the best American masters of book-plate designing. In all the plates from the hand of this artist that are here grouped, and which may be regarded as quite typical of him, there are only two that do not contain a book as a detail somewhere in the finished plate.

One of the exceptions is the plate of the Studio Club that gains infinitely by the omission of a book in the plate as produced. The grouping of the five observers (symbolic of the members of the Studio Club) around the feminine portrait is most charming, and to the writer it appears one of the happiest of recent productions in appropriate book-plates.

Mr. Fisher’s feminine figures that he introduces into many of his plates are likewise exceedingly effective. This is particularly the case when to the charms of femininity he has added those of symbolism, as in the case of the plate for Miss Winifred Knight, in which the graceful female masker appears at the shrine of the idealized god Pan, who writes, it may be something oracular, in her proffered album. The figure is gracefully posed and the lines of the arms and neck are marked by pleasant curves.

In the plate of Maie Bruce Douglas, Mr. Fisher may have been influenced by Hans Christian Andersen. At any rate, whether or not this is so, he has neatly and most effectively grouped the old-time jester with his cap and bells, the pointed shoes from whence came our modern samples, and the maiden with the quaintness of head-dress and drapery, that at least suggests the fairy and the incidental sacred stork, making this plate with its shelf of books and the panel of repeated heraldic shields very attractive even to the chance observer.

In the plates for the Misses Mary N. Lewis, Elizabeth Langdon, Leila H. Cole and Elizabeth Allen there are several diverse methods shown in which convention has been pleasingly utilized. The vine and tree forms that are motifs are very effective, and in all of these we see suggestions of treatment similar to that which stands out perhaps a little more pronouncedly in the plate of Miss Douglas. Costume quaintness, charm of pose, graceful outline, the tendency toward lecturn detail and delicacy of touch, are in each instance here seen to be characteristic of the artist.

The plate of John Charles Gage has in it the atmosphere of the monastery. Two friars are busy with a folio manuscript that has been beautifully illuminated. The one reads the lessons for the day from the book of hours. The other has a pleasing bit of gossip that he is telling to his brother friar as he reads, and the reader hears with eagerness with his ears while he reads without absorption with his eyes.

Into the plate of Samuel H. Hudson the atmosphere of the monastery is also introduced. The cordelier sits absorbedly reading his matins. Through the open window of the monkish cell is seen the morning medieval landscape whose charms exercise no influence upon the solitary recluse, solitary save for the monkey who plays sad havoc with the vellum volume that lies upon the cell floor and the destruction of which the Franciscan is too absorbed to notice. The monkey as a foil for the ascetic in this plate shows that Mr. Fisher has a strong appreciation of the most delicate humor, which here crops out most delightfully. The border makes the plate a trifle heavy, but this can easily be excused because of the charm of the plate otherwise.

The dog is given a prominent place in the plate of Miss Lula Thomas Wear. He dominates even the books, and it may be that the owner prefers her dachshund to her library, although it is evident that her books have some place in her esteem.

The design on the plate of Stanley Shepard suggests a derivation from an old print. The caravel rides upon the waves according to the conception of the old-time engravers. The anchor, the sword fish of the deep sea, and the sea-stars all suggest the ocean voyager who has deep down in his heart a love of books.

In contrast with the plate of Mr. Shepard’s appears that bearing the name of Silvanus Macy, Jr. The love of hunting stands out right boldly here, and in the fox hunt does Mr. Macy undoubtedly revel. He could not have such a book-plate otherwise, and live with it every day, let it be in all his books and have it stand for him as it does, unless it was fairly representative of the man’s personality. That is what makes a book-plate so eminently interesting, aside from the art work put upon it. Books appeal to all sorts and conditions of men, as the work of Mr. Fisher’s here grouped clearly indicates.

The plate from the books of Miss Edna B. Stockhouse is a trifle shadowy in motif notwithstanding which there can be no doubt the owner loves books. The face in the book-plate reads. There is also a love of the beautiful in ceramics indicated as an incident in the plate. No wonder the head wears an aureole. The “Bi Lauda” plate is that of a secret society at Wellsville, N.Y., and we, therefore, forgive if we cannot forget its poverty of bookish design.

In the personal plate of the designer, of all those here reproduced, we catch glimpses of the artist’s own personality. We see him as a book-lover and something of his inspiration is spread out before us. He goes reading along, carrying reserve volumes in case the one that engages his attention in the portraiture is happily finished. Mr. Fisher has been producing book-plates only since 1898, since which time he has to his credit some forty examples of work in this field. He is perhaps happiest in his rendition of the plate pictorial, and he has sometimes tinted his plates most charmingly. Mr. Fisher prepared for Cornell at Phillips Academy, Andover, Mass. At Cornell he studied architecture for two years, with especial attention to drawing. He also studied, for six months, at the Art Institute, Chicago, Ill., whither he went from Cornell. He has been largely self-taught in the matter of designing, but his work indicates that his teacher was a good one. He has privately but carefully studied the work of the best modern pen-and-ink draughtsmen, and from this he has formed his personal style. The methods and craftsmanship of reproduction were the subject of special study on his part while he was with one of the large Chicago engraving houses. Anything that comes from his hand will be sure of the most kindly reception, so long as his work is maintained at the present high standard.

BOOK-PLATES OF TO-DAY
TONNELÉ & COMPANY
NEW YORK