A New Caricaturist
A New Caricaturist is an article published in the Daily Express on 27 august 1913.
The article includes a caricature of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle by Jan Roscius de Janosza Rosciszewski (aka Tom Titt).
A New Caricaturist
Striking Work by Another Russian Artist.
Mr. Jan Roscius de Janosza Rosciszewski — he has wisely, adopted the somewhat simpler pen name of Tom Titt — is a master caricaturist. He shares with Max Beerbohm an almost uncanny power of seeing the, essentials of his subject, and of revealing them in his portraits, the mere trimmings being neglected. He exaggerates, but he exaggerates with insight. His suggestions are always complete, and they are, as it seems to me, always true.
Tom Titt does not aim at the intense drama unquestionably achieved by Mr. Will Dyson, though it would be achieved still more satisfactorily if Mr. Dyson were not attracted by almost brutal ugliness, but there are drama, and movement in many of his drawings, notably in the quite remarkable caricature of the Bishop of London reproduced on this page.
Tom Titt, again, is not equal to Sem in adding beauty to 'suggestion, which means that he has not the Frenchman's fine sympathy (shown, for example, in his Sardou), but his Mr. Henry Chaplin is a really beautiful drawing, as are the Mr. Balfour, which we also reproduce, and the Mr. Cunninghame-Graham.
Mr. Rosciszewski is a Russian, as was Ospovat, and he is almost, if not quite, his fellow-countryman's peer. There is nothing, perhaps, in his volume of caricatures so genial and intensely humorous as Ospovat's Miss Marie Lloyd, but for all that the fun of his Duke of Norfolk, his Mr. Hall Caine, his Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, is quite splendid.
We have referred to Tom Titt's capacity of arriving at essentials. His Mr. Granville Barker might be labelled "Self-Satisfaction," his Mr. Asquith "Our Mutual Friend," his Mr. Balfour "Detachment," his Mr. Lloyd George "The Artful," his Mr. Bonar Law "Dogged Does It," his Mr. Masterman "Uriah Heep," his Mr. Cunninghame-Graham "Dignity," and so on.
Tom Titt's caricafures are published in volume form at five shillings by the New Age Press, Cursitor-street, E.C., by whose courtesy the accompanying examples of his art are reproduced here. His work individual and remarkable, and it deserves a wide sale.
