Excerpt from Illustrated Catalog to an Exhibition of Drawings by Old Masters

In the field of engravings, we find also that while European institutions and private collectors are most keen' to obtain some object that has up to its rediscovery escaped the notice of the authorities - the undescribed rarity - the American collector prefers to obtain specimens of the known masterpieces that are fully described and established. The great advantage in collecting engravings lies in the fact that in most cases one can Show something in black and white to prove the authenticity of the piece, while this can only be done in few instances with drawings. There is nothing practically to prove the authenticity of a draw ing in most cases but the drawing itself, and the name of the artist to whom it may be attributed might mean very little if the drawing did not support the attribution. Even in the collect ing of engravings the American collector has been mainly guided and attracted by the name. For a very long time he restricted his aims to the work of the two greatest of names in the field, Diirer and Rembrandt, while masters equally important and more tempting to obtain on account of their greater rarity, like Schongauer, Mantegna, Lucas van Leyden, were more or less ignored. The name, however, which, if substantiated sufficiently, adds materially to the value of the object, is only of secondary importance with drawings of old masters.

There is a drawing in this collection, which in the catalogue of its previous owner was given to Memling, an attribution which, for this reason, is here retained; but would the drawing be less beautiful or valuable if simply recorded as by a Bruges Master of the second part of the I sth Century P - Must a French crayon drawing of the 18th Century showing a nude female figure in exquisite grace and beauty, necessarily be by Boucher to interest a collector?

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