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Qeorge S. Swarth
STANKORD UNIVKRSm' LIBRARIES
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4
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EX • L I B P^I S
A- COLLECTION OF
BOOIC-PLATE
DESIGNS • BY
HERBER.T
GREGSON
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" The artist brings all things into order ^ making one part
to harmonize and accord with another until he constructs
a regular and systematic whole,^^ — Plato.
HE above quotation Mr. Gregson has
taken as his ideal, and a study of the plates
shown herewith will show how successful he
has been in this regard. It is now some four
years since I issued a little brochure on his work,
which at that time was rendered entirely in
heavy line, and to those who possess this earlier
collection, these beautiful pidlorial plates will
come as a pleasant surprise. During the last
few years Mr. Gregson has been changing his
style, lightening his lines and tones and using
a decorative motif with more meaning to it,
and has evolved a style and individuality quite
distinctive to himself and wholly unlike that of
the other designers in this field.
While the plates are of the pictorial type, the
principles of design have not been overlooked;
the different parts of the plates are in perfect
harmony each with the other, and the designs
taken as a whole have that accord which should
be shown in the work of a designer who has
succeeded in originating and adapting to his
own peculiar method of expression the require-
ments and possibilities of his art. Nearly every-
one who can wield a brush or pretend to any
talent in drawing, in these days, tries his luck
at a book-plate, which brings into existence a
great many plates that were better left unmade.
Good designs are produced in this as in the
other lines of the profession, but too often they
are imitations in style of treatment suggested
in fine things done long before, or brilliant
ideas of the past, altered but seldom improved,
to serve the purpose of a book-plate. Often
an original idea is well conceived but badly
drawn, more often the drawing is very good
but wanting in design, in which case it is the
work of one who has technical training but
little or no idea of composition.
The plates shown are of such general ex-
cellence that extended comment would seem
to be unnecessary, but attention might well be
called to the armorial designs which evidence
a good feeling, and strict regard, for the prin-
ciples of heraldry; for designs of an odd, unu-
sual character the plate of The Troutsdale
Press stands pre-eminent, as well as the last
plate in the book, designed for a printer.
The J. Reid is a fine example of a border
design, rich and decorative, and still without
taking too much from the essential features.
For beauty and gracefulness, the designs for
Cynthia W. Lynch, Beatrice West and Katha-
rine Dudley Gregson show that the artist is
able to handle successfully feminine plates,
which require lightness and dainty forms; for
a lover of nature, surely the John Nelson Slade
is extremely successful and tasteful.
And finally, as showing plates of an entirely
new character and treatment, there are the
Washingtoniana and Lincolniana designs, in-
tended for use in colledlions of books relating
to these two great Americans. Mr. Gregson
has in these shown an ability, and achieved a
result that well might be envied by many of
the older and better known artists. In the
former, a combination of line and halftone, the
frame is strictly Colonial, surmounting the de-
sign is a figure representing the "Spirit of 1 776"
while on either side of the frame at the lower
end is perched the American eagle; the laurel
is cleverly introduced at the base of the frame
indicative of peace, and thus with the design
at the top making a beautiful rendering of the
phrase, "First in war, first in peace," etc. The
decoration in the Lincolniana is quite chaste
and severe; in the upper part is the American
eagle and shield, which is intended to carry
out the simile of Lincoln as the saviour of the
Ship of State which Washington so nobly
built up.
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