Drawing and Designing (Kensington Art Series)

From the author’s Introduction

The advantages offered by this system are as follows:

I. By means of it any person who is capable of learning to write may also learn not only to draw, but also to design or to invent original outline decorative designs.

II. Designing as well as drawing, by it, go hand in hand from the first lesson.

III. Every lesson is very easy, and forms a gradual advance from the preceding. All that is required is, that every one as it comes shall be perfectly mastered and practiced.

IV. The pupil who shall thoroughly master this system, will have learned all the lines and curves which occur in organic nature — that is to say, in vegetation, in animals, or the human form.

V. It explains very clearly how the most graceful and apparently capricious lines and ornaments result from only two or three very simple principles. And it also shows how the most apparently bewildering and complicated " Arabesque'' patterns may be evolved from easy beginnings.

VI. It forms the alphabet of all the minor arts, such as modelling, embroidery, wood carving, leather work, inlaying, ornamental and practical working in wood, metals, &c., since anyone who can design simple patterns may with perfect confidence attempt any of them.

VII. It teaches spacing, or the adapting patterns to given surfaces, and clearly shows how to make designs for panels, round or square, vases, bellows, fans, borders, frames, wallpapers, carpets, book-covers, etc.

VIII. It has been successfully taught by the author to nearly two thousand pupil.

IX. The effort to design makes the pupil think and invent. It awakens interest and attention, and very soon develops an intelligence which not only makes of the pupil a better copyist, but a better student in all branches of education. It was found that in the public schools of Philadelphia, children who attended the classes in Industrial Art, and who learned design by the system here set forth, excelled in all other studies.