OLD MASTER PAINTINGS IN NORTH AMERICA; OVER 3000 MASTERPIECES BY 50 GREATARTISTS by John D. MorseReview by: Ilene R. SchechterARLIS/NA Newsletter, Vol. 8, No. 3 (MAY 1980), p. 102Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of the Art Libraries Society of NorthAmericaStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/27946313 .

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102 ARLIS/NA Newsletter. May 1980

Becker since the biographies and bibliographic citations are more current. This volume should be particularly useful in smaller art research libraries; for researchers it is ideal for home or travel use. If you can't manage to own a set of Thieme-Becker, buy this.

DICTIONARY OF VICTORIAN ENGRAVERS, PRINT PUBLISHERS AND THEIR WORKS, by Rodney Engen Cambridge: Chadwick-Healey: Teaneck: Somerset House, 1979. 246 p., illus. ISBN 0-85946-054-X: ?28.00; 0-914146-86-6: $60.00.

This is a collection of biographies of reproductive engravers who worked on metal or stone copying works in other media, chiefly painting. Engen's chief source is the lists kept by the Printseller's Association, later the Fine Art Trade Guild, a trade association which was interested in strictly limited editions of major contemporary paintings. He has fleshed out this heretofore hard to-find information by going through the standard dictionaries from Graves to Waters. The amount of information on each individual seems to be based on the amount available in the

published sources (listed for each artist) plus the lists of the Association; this is not always a reflection of the individual's

importance. The last twenty pages are an alphabetical list of

publishers, printsellers, etc., giving dates and long lists of prints published. The thirty-nine prints reproduced are well-done, but one must question their utility in a work of this nature. While the

binding is sturdy and attractive, the format and face are overly generous: wide margins and a typewriter-like font set ragged-right, with no use of small type for long lists of prints, make the book bulk larger than it is. Lastly, the paper is not sturdy enough for a book with 'Dictionary' in its title, and will, I suspect, soon turn brittle. In sum, this is a useful book of a specialized nature at a substantial price. Its real value lies in the access to the Printseller's Association lists.

Jack Perry Brown

THE DESIGN DIRECTORY 1979-80. W. Daniel Weiler, ed. Evanston: Wefler & Associates, Inc., P.O. Box 1591, 1979. 43 p. $38.00.

The author, who is a management consultant in Chicago, lists over 700 design firms in the United States. Entries are arranged geographically; each gives address and phone number, the firm's date of founding, its employees, and services offered. The types of

design services offered by the firms listed are graphics, interiors, products, and packaging. This directory provides a very selective list although its compilers attempted a more complete survey of the field. In the foreword Mr. Wefler estimates there are approximate ly 3,000 design firms in the United States; only those which responded to his requests for information are included in the

present publication.

Morse, John D. OLD MASTER PAINTINGS IN NORTH AMERICA; OVER 3000 MASTERPIECES BY 50 GREAT ARTISTS. New York: Abbeville Press, 1979. 309 p. illus. LC 79-1056. $19.95.

This is a revised and expanded edition of Old Masters in America (Rand McNally, 1955). Morse has selected fifty European painters, active from the fourteenth to the mid-nineteenth centuries, whose work can be found in 106 North American

museums (four are Canadian). For each artist there are: a

biographical sketch; a brief essay written at a layman's level which describes the painter's style and analyzes the work reproduced in color; a geographical museum list providing title, dimensions, and date of each work; and one color and one to four black-and-white illustrations. The latter are of the calibre of art history survey text books: they suffice for identification, although many are too dark. The color plates are arranged in six unpaged sections without cross-references from the essays. A Geographical Index to Museums, appearing at the end of the volume, lists each museum's address and notable artists in its collection; painters* names in

capital letters have entries in Morse's text. The book's reference value lies primarily in finding North

American locations and sizes of the 3,098 European paintings listed. Morse's book can also be used to help plan travel itineraries, although there are numerous guidebooks which are restricted to smaller, more manageable geographical areas, plus major museum collection catalogs which treat their subjects in greater depth;

these books, however, generally lack Morse's listing and cross

indexing features. The author admits that his list of fifty artists is

personal and open to criticism; yet readers may be surprised to see

painters such as Bonington included, but Ingres omitted. One can also wonder about the exclusion of some notable museums, such as the recently-opened Yale Center for British Art. The author has

substantially revised his 1955 book; ten more artists are

represented, twelve extra or different museums have been

surveyed, 936 additional paintings have been listed, there are more

illustrations, and the volume is larger and more attractive. Morse's book is for libraries which have a large art browsing collection, or which would find the two types of geographical lists helpful. As there are better dictionaries of artists and more attractive coffee table books, this volume's real value lies in its geographical lists. Yet these are marred by a serious limitation?they still sample only fifty European old masters who are represented in 106 North

American museums.

llene R. Schechter

Sartin, Stephen. A DICTIONARY OF BRITISH NARRATIVE PAINTERS. Leigh-on-Sea, England: F. Lewis, 1978. 78 p., 24 pi. ?18.50.

Repeating the format of F. Lewis's other dictionaries of British

animal, flower, marine and military painters, this latest

compilation is a bluebound volume printed on heavy paper with

generous margins. Less generous is the amount of information

supplied for each artist: it consists of dates or period of artistic

activity when known, a brief characterization of the painter and his

subjects, where he exhibited, and the names of the narrative

paintings. Perhaps the most helpful feature about this very specialized reference source is the definition of the narrative genre contained in its preface, the culling of artists whose paintings fall within this category, and the illustrations (indicated in the text by an asterisk beside the artist's name, all of which serve to isolate and describe this particular corner of art history. For libraries with extensive collections in British art only.

Smith, Alexander Jr. FRANK O HARA: A COMPREHENSIVE BIBLIOGRAPHY. New York: Garland Pub. Co., 1979. 323 p. LC 77-83404. $35.00.

Poet Frank O'Hara was a man of diversified interests, as evidenced by the numerous art forms he created, and this

bibliography reflects his varied talents. Sections of the volume include the expected books, pamphlets, and periodicals, as well as the more elusive art work and music. Alexander Smith Jr. has examined and meticulously noted details of each item in the

bibliography. Initially, each entry is described physically; then information on price, number of copies published, authors of the introduction and bibliography, and publishers' comments is given.

Annotations to each source are lengthy. Three supplementary appendixes provide the following lists: ( 1 )

unpublished collections of poems, (2) participation in art exhibitions, (3) checklist of manuscripts and selected unpublished

materials in public collections. Mr. Smith's acknowledged goal is to do justice to all the aspects

of O'Hara's work and to help the reader locate materials of

particular interest. He has succeeded in creating a well-researched

bibliographic tool whose only handicap may prove to be its thoroughness or inclusion of irrelevant data.

Lamia Doumato

PHOTOGRAPHY WEST AND NORTH y^dams /Xnsel YOSEMITE AND THE RANGE OF LIGHT. Boston: New York Graphic Society, 1979. ISBN 0-8212-0757-4 $75.00.

Ansel Adams has played an important role as pioneer, defender, theoretician and teacher in the development of 20th-century

American art. He assumed the responsibilities of Alfred Stieglitzes post as defender of a new aesthetic; he founded a movement which fostered some of the greatest American art photographers; and he

perfected and taught the craft of photography as an expression of fine art. However, his photographs speak much louder than any retelling of his role in the history of photography. To focus in on

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