Enfilade

Thomas Daniell, The Old Court House and Writers’ Building, 1786, hand-coloured etching, 403 × 524 mm
(Philadelphia Museum of Art; image Thomas Primeau).

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The long eighteenth century in the latest issue of Print Quarterly:

Print Quarterly 42.1 (March 2025)

a r t i c l e s

• Jalen Chang, “‘Bengalee Work’ before Aquatint: Thomas Daniell’s Views of Calcutta”, pp. 20–30.
This article reevaluates eleven hand-coloured etchings by Thomas Daniell (1749–1840) held by the Philadelphia Museum of Art, previously presumed to be published states of his 1786–88 print series Views of Calcutta, often cited as the earliest aquatints made outside of Europe. Devoid of the rudimentary aquatinting and hand-coloured skies which characterize other extant examples, the relatively bare objects document a distinct stage of Daniell’s artistic process and are unprecedented in their survival. The article suggests that these prints were trial proofs never intended for publication or sale, meant instead to serve as colour tests for Daniell and his team of Indian copyists. Furthermore, the article considers early imperial printmaking and its ideological functions in British India.

Charlotte Bonaparte, Self-Portrait, ca. 1824–26, oil on canvas, 885 × 730 mm (Princeton University Art Museum).

• Thomas Busciglio-Ritter, “From Brussels to Point Breeze: Charlotte Bonaparte’s Lithographic Landscapes, 1821–25”, pp. 31–43.
This article discusses a series of twelve lithographs by Charlotte Bonaparte (1802–1839), niece to Napoleon I, of North American views known as the Vues pittoresques de l’Amérique dessinées par la Comtesse Charlotte de Survillier (printed 1824), which she completed and disseminated on her return to Europe. The series, published in Brussels, became the first lithographic scenic views of the United States to circulate among western European audiences. The article situates Bonaparte’s landscape views within the context of transatlantic print culture of the early nineteenth century, touching on the role of women as producers of landscape images and the introduction of lithography as a new medium for American audiences.

n o t e s  a n d  r e v i e w s

• Bernard Aikema, Review of the exhibition catalogue Connecting Worlds: Artists and Travel, ed. by Anita Viola Sganzerla and Stephanie Buck (Paul Holberton Publishing, 2023), pp. 64–66.

• Catherine Jenkins, Review of the exhibition catalogue Trésors en noir et blanc. Estampes du Petit Palais, de Dürer à Toulouse-Lautrec, by Anne-Charlotte Cathelineau, Joëlle Raineau-Lehuédé, and Clara Roca (Paris Musées, 2023), pp. 74–76.

• Ellis Tinios, Review of Hokusai’s Fuji, ed. by Kyoko Wada (Thames and Hudson, 2023), pp. 76–77.

• Victoria Sancho Lobis, Review of Aaron Hyman, Rubens in Repeat: The Logic of the Copy in Colonial Latin America (Getty Research Institute, 2021), pp. 99–105.