Author Archives: Julie Mellby

The person with the most nose knows most

Nikolaĭ Vasilʹevich Gogolʹ (1809-1852), The Nose by Nikolai Gogol; English translation and commentary by Stanislav Shvabrin; sixteen drawings with collage by William Kentridge (San Francisco: Arion Press, 2021). Copy 17 of 40. Deluxe edition. Graphic Arts Collection 2021- in process

 

“The edition is limited to 250 copies for sale with 26 lettered hors commerce copies reserved … Of these, 190 Limited edition copies are bound with cloth spines and paper sides, and 20 Variant plus 40 Deluxe edition copies are bound with leather spines and cork paper sides. All copies are signed by the artist and presented in clamshell boxes accompanied by a flipbook, “His Majesty Comrade Nose”, produced in an edition of 350 copies.

The Deluxe edition includes a photogravure “Surveying His Escape” with red pencil markings by the artist. 40 prints plus 5 Printer’s Proofs, 3 Artist’s Proofs, and 2 B.A.T. Proofs have been editioned by Lothar Osterburg in Red Hook, New York on 300 gsm Somerset with gampi chine collé and kozo insets.”–Colophon.


 

From the prospectus: Originally published in 1836 in Alexander Pushkin’s magazine Sovremennik (The Contemporary), The Nose tells the story of Major Kovalyov, a St. Petersburg official whose nose develops a life of its own. The absurdity of the tale, in which Kovalyov awakens to find his nose gone, then later comes to find it has surpassed him in social rank, lays bare the anxiety that plagued Russia after Peter the Great introduced The Table of Ranks: a document reorganizing feudal Russian nobility, by placing emphasis on the military, civil service and the imperial court in determining an aristocrat’s social standing.

 

 

For this edition, Arion Press chose to collaborate with artist William Kentridge, who directed and designed a visually dazzling 2010 Metropolitan Opera production of Dmitri Shostakovich’s adaptation of The Nose. This is his second project with the press, following The Lulu Plays, published in tandem with his 2015 production of the Alban Berg opera, Lulu, also for the Met. Kentridge’s method combines drawing, writing, film, performance, music, theater and collaborative practices to create works of art that are grounded in politics, science, literature, and history.

 

 

This edition includes a photogravure “Surveying His Escape” printed in warm black ink on 300 gsm Somerset with gampi chine collé and kozo insets, editioned by Lothar Osterburg in Red Hook, New York. See also: https://graphicarts.princeton.edu/2018/03/30/library-dreams-after-magrittes-time-transfixed/

Robert Penn (Wichapi Cik’ala)

Robert “Bobby” Penn (Wichapi Cik’ala, or Little Star, 1946-1999), Butterfly, 1994. Etching. Graphic Arts Collection GA 2008.00897

Robert “Bobby” Penn (Wichapi Cik’ala, or Little Star, 1946-1999), Singer, 1994. Etching. Graphic Arts Collection GA 2008.00899.

In an attempt to solve one unidentified work each week, these three etchings have been attributed to South Dakota painter Robert Penn, known to his friends as Bobby and who signed them B. Penn. Born in Omaha, Nebraska, Penn taught art at his alma mater the University of South Dakota until 1986 when he quit to pursue his art full time.

Penn was a protégé of the late Oscar Howe, and at one time, he was a work-study assistant for the internationally known Sioux artist. However, Penn’s style was uniquely his own as he explored the art world with varied media and styles. The Akta Lakota Museum site includes a quote from the artist:

“Abstraction of symbols and themes can re-interpret and integrate the modern world as seen from an Indian viewpoint without strict adherence to traditional art forms and can transcend both worlds to become contemporary modern art as well as a cultural statement. I am constantly aware of the danger of being typecast as far as subject matter goes; there is far more to my vision than just recreating pictures of the past. Art has always been my central issue … it is also my biggest prayer,” Penn once said.

http://aktalakota.stjo.org/site/PageServer?pagename=alm_homepage


Robert “Bobby” Penn (Wichapi Cik’ala, or Little Star, 1946-1999), Red road, 1994. Etching. Graphic Arts Collection GA 2008.00898.

Penn designed several murals, including one at Springfield College, Springfield, MA and one commissioned by the Hennepin County (Minneapolis) Medical Center. It is not clear which master printer helped the artist created these etchings.

Jules Léotard by Jean Émile Durandeau

Jules Léotard (1830-1870), Mémoires de Léotard (Paris: Chez tous les libraires, 1860). Firestone recap 4298.579. Fold-out by Durandeau printed on green paper.

Jean Émile Durandeau (1827-1880) is best remembered for his lithographic sheet music designs and caricatures of popular members of French society. While he was a contemporary of Étienne Carjat (1828-1906) and Honoré Daumier (1808-1879), his work has not been equally recorded. Durandeau was the chief illustrator of the satirical newspaper Le Drôlatique and wrote the popular Civilians and Soldiers (1878).

One of the beloved figures he drew was Jules Léotard (1838-1870), circus performer and trapeze artist extraordinaire. A member of both the Cirque Napoléon and the Cirque d’Hiver, Léotard made a flying somersault between two swinging bars in 1859, perfecting the flying trapeze. Songs were written and stories told about the man and his acrobatics, many illustrated by Durandeau.

With his published memoirs, Léotard included an enormous lithographic fold-out by Durandeau, picturing Léotard flying over Paris, with his fans holding heart shaped kites and practicing their own trapeze acrobatics.


 

Geminian crying out “I want to make my name known to the world”

Francesco Villamena (ca. 1565–1624), Geminian ‘Caldarostaro’ [the Roast Chestnut Seller from a series of six Street Traders and Mendicant Friars], 1597-1601. Engraving. Graphic Arts Collection GA Italian prints, GC094/Box 02. *note, his name has been corrected here to reflect the printing on the engraving, although it is written with various spellings on the internet.

Inscription: Io son quel Geminian caldarostaro / Che voglio l nome mio far noto al mondo. / E perchè nel gridar, non trovo paro, / Con mia voce conquasso a Pluto il fondo. // O fusto ben compito, a me si caro / Ritratto sol per farmi piu giocondo / Ch’ essendo hoggi da molti riguardato / Mi glorio sol del mio felice stato.
[= I am Geminian, the roast chestnut seller, / who wants to make my name known to the world. / And why not, in shouting I have no equal, / With my voice I make hell tremble. // O well-done barrel [belly], so dear to me / Portrayed only to make me more joyful / Being seen today by so many / I glory only in my happy state.]

Text from Michael Bury, The Print in Italy 1550-1620, British Museum 2001 cat.116: “One of what are incorrectly called The Six Cries of Rome (see also V.10-53). Although some of these figures appear to be real individuals, familiar to Villamena and to those to whom he dedicated the prints, the tradition out of which they come is that of representations of trades. There are Flemish engravings that could have had an influence, for example the interesting series of Four Elements of 1597, which figured trades by Claesz Jansz. (Hollstein nos.12-15).”

This is not to be confused with a later 1760 engraving of Jean Ramponneau (1724-1802), a Parisian wine seller, clearly traced from Villamena and printed laterally reversed:

Portrait de Mr Ramponneau, Cabartier de la basse Courtille en bonnet de nu[it] (A Paris chez Charpentier rue Saint Jacques au Coq, March 13, 1760).  http://catalogue.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/cb41512534v

According to the British Museum, Ramponneau (or Ramponeau) was “A celebrated innkeeper; born in Vignol (Nièvre), died in Paris; he moved to Paris in c. 1740 as a wine merchant, and set up a tavern between the rues de l’Oreillon and de Saint-Maur, the ‘cabaret des Marronniers’. The word ‘Ramponneau’ was integrated into French culture and used as a descriptive word (see the Encyclopédie méthodique des Arts et Métiers, 1790 and Larousse du XIXe siècle, 1875, under ‘ramponneau’).”

 

Sports of a Country Fair or Watching People Fall Down

Thomas Rowlandson (1757–1827), Sports of a Country Fair, 1810. Hand colored etchings. Oversize Rowlandson 1807.51f

 

Thomas Rowlandson (1757–1827), Sports of a Country Fair, 1810. Hand colored etchings. Oversize Rowlandson 1807.51f

Thomas Rowlandson (1757–1827), Sports of a Country Fair, 1810. Hand colored etchings. Oversize Rowlandson 1807.51f

 

In 1810, Thomas Rowlandson etched four plates with the title: Sports of a Country Fair, which were published in Thomas Tegg’s Caricature Magazine or Hudibrastic Mirror. At least one has its own date, October 5, 1810, and the rest are presumed to correspond. The first three are listed as part the first, part the second, and part the third but the fourth is again only presumed to be in that sequence. People struggling to escape a fire is not as humorous as the others.

 

What is interesting is that the following year, Rowlandson used the same scene of visitors falling down a set of stairs to lampoon visitors to the annual spring exhibition of the Royal Academy. Anyone who has tried to climb the steep spiral staircase at Somerset House on the Strand can appreciate the difficulty. Together the two etchings represent a wonderful juxtaposition of rich verses poor; high culture verses low popular fun; a rush to safety verses a rush to be seen.

 


Thomas Rowlandson (1757-1827), Exhibition Stare Case, ca. 1811. Hand colored etching. Graphic Arts Collection GA 2014.00789. https://graphicarts.princeton.edu/2018/04/14/exhibition-stare-case/

We assume the crowd is there to see the Spring exhibit, the highlight of the social season, although they might also be attending one of the popular lectures held in 1811, including talks by Henry Fuseli on painting; John Soane on architecture; Anthony Carlisle on anatomy; J. M. W. Turner on perspective; and John Flaxman on sculpture. Or they might also be attending the exhibit of the Society of Painters in Water-Colours, held annually beginning in 1804, where Rowlandson exhibited.

 

Bartholomew Fair drawn by John Nixon

Thomas Rowlandson (1756-1827) after a drawing by John Nixon (ca. 1759-1818), Bartholomew Fair, no date [ca. 1807]. Hand colored etching. Grego II, p. 92. Graphic Arts Collection Rowlandson 1785e vol. 8. Gift of Dickson Q. Brown, Class of 1895.

 

 

Dickson Q. Brown, Class of 1895, gave Princeton University Library a bound set of Thomas Rowlandson caricatures, with approximately 300 sheets pasted into 10 volumes. These should not be confused with the similarly bound sets of Rowlandson prints in Caricature Museum and/or Caricature Magazine, also donated by Brown.

Volume 3 includes John Nixon’s teaming scene at Bartholomew Fair, which took place each year on August 24 in West Smithfield, London. At the center of the print, etched by Thomas Rowlandson, are sideshow attractions including Miles’ Menagerie, Saunder’s Tragic Theatre, Gingle’s Grand Medley, Polito’s Grand Collection, and Punch. Of particular interest, just to the right of Gyngles booth and below a tightrope juggler, is a banner advertising Miss Beffin (also spelled Biffin or Beffen), an artist born without arms or legs.

The Graphic Arts Collection holds several watercolors painted by Biffin (1784-1850), which she made by holding the brush with her teeth. Biffin’s family contracted with Emmanuel Dukes, a traveling showman, to present her as one of his sideshow attractions. She traveled from town to town, painting or writing for the public’s entertainment. Dukes publicized her as “The Eighth Wonder!” and pocketed all the proceeds from the sale of her watercolors. Thanks to the patronage from George Douglas, the sixteenth Earl of Morton (1761-1827), Biffin was finally released from her contract and established a studio in the Strand, London, where she painted miniature portraits. For more: https://www.princeton.edu/~graphicarts/2011/05/painted_without_hands_1844.html

[above] Sarah Biffin (1784-1850), Portrait of Captain James West (1808-1884), 1844. Watercolor on paper. Graphic Arts. 2011- in process. Gift of W. Allen Scheuch II, Class of 1976, given in honor of Meg Whitman, Class of 1977. Graphic Arts Collection GA 2011.01448

 

On the far left side of the print are carnival rides with an early Ferris wheel and three boat swings, one dumping its passengers in piles on the ground. The scene relates to a preliminary drawing by Nixon [below]  of the Sydney Gardens in Bath, which shows a standing version of the boat swing, invented by John Joseph Merlin (1735-1803).

 

A 21st century version called the Coney Clipper entertains the masses at Coney Island in Brooklyn:

 

 

An early 20th-century American co-ed

Merab Carroll Gamble Brook (1896 or 1898 – 1995), Photography album, ca.1921. Graphic Arts Collection GA 2021- in process

Marab Gamble went to school at Lebanon Valley College, Annville, Pennsylvania, eight miles from Hershey. Established in 1866, the college was the first in that area to include both men and women as undergraduates. Their website notes “While not the first in Pennsylvania to be co-educational, it was first among its degree conferring competitors in Eastern Pennsylvania. Swathmore though it received its Charter in 1864 did not open until 1869. The University of Pennsylvania did not become co-educational until 1877″.

Gamble kept a photography album with 366 carefully cut and captioned prints focused on her student days from 1916 to 1918. Directly after graduation, she moved back with her family in Buffalo, where she took a job as a high school teacher. This is the address at the front of her album. Fifteen years later she married Mr. Brook and can be found in some records listed as Marab Brook. Eventually they settled in Goshen, NY, where they both continued teaching.

The album holds many informal snapshots from Lebanon Valley College that show Gamble working and relaxing with her friends. Many have lively captions, such as “We don’t believe in trouble!” and “Off for a good time!” The album documents several trips, with and without her school class, as well as sporting events, contests, and concerts. In all, it shows the active life of an early 20th century American co-ed.

“Saint Paul enlevé jusqu’au troisième ciel” for Paul Scarron

Guillaume Chasteau (1635-1683) after Nicolas Poussin (1594-1665), Saint Paul Raised to the Third Heaven [Saint Paul enlevé jusqu’au troisième ciel], 17th century. Graphic Arts Collection GA2012.01350

When you travel to Paris this summer, don’t forget to go to room 826 in the Richelieu Wing at the Louvre, to visit Nicolas Poussin’s The Rapture of Saint Paul, painted mid-17th-century (1649 – 1650) [seen below]. The Graphic Arts Collection has only the engraving after Poussin by Guillaume Chasteau.

“After moving to Rome from his native France in 1624, Nicolas Poussin made his reputation with paintings of subjects from classical literature. In contrast to the extravagance of Baroque art, Poussin developed a way of framing moments on drama and extreme emotion in harmonious, beautifully balanced landscape and architectural settings.

In 1640, summoned by King Luis XIII he returned to Paris where he was courted by French art patrons, such as Paul Fréart de Chantelou. Through Chantelou, the well-connected poet and playwright Paul Scarron commissioned a painting from Poussin—a commission he did his best to defer, since he despised Scarron and his burlesque plays.

In 1649, however, now once again settled in Rome, he finally started work on the painting that became The Ecstasy of St Paul (Musée du Louvre, Paris)….—Michael Bird, Artists’ Letters: Leonardo da Vinci to David Hockney (2019).


French poet and dramatist, Paul Scarron (1610-1660) studied at the Sorbonne and acquired the patronage of Charles de Beaumanoir, Bishop of Le Mans. In 1652, he married Françoise d’Aubigné, (later Madame de Maintenon) who patiently cared for him when he was forced to use a wheelchair and eventually became bedridden due to his crippled spine. Scarron wrote many comedies, among them “Jodelet, ou le maître valet” (1645); “Les trois Dorothées” (1646); “L’héritier ridicule” (1649); “Don Japhet d’Arménie” (1652); “L’Ecolier de Salamanque” (1654); and “Le gardien de soi-même” (1655).

This anonymous portrait of Paul Scarron is owned by the Musée de Tessé.

Poussin, Nicolas (1594-1665), The Rapture of Saint Paul [or The Ecstasy of Saint Paul], 1649-1650. Oil on canvas. Painted for the writer Paul Scarron (1610-1660), the work was acquired by Louis XIV from the Duke of Richelieu in 1665. See more: https://www.nicolas-poussin.com/oeuvres/ravissement-saint-paul-louvre/

The copper plate for this engraving is held at the Louvre, as noted in Catalogue des planches gravées composant le fonds de la Chalcographie et dont les épreuves se vendent dans cet établissement au Musée National du Louvre (1851)

 

It is interesting that the painting Scarron commissioned from Poussin, would come to be owned by Louis XIV, who also secretly married Madame de Maintenon, once married to Scarron.

Paul Scarron (1610-1660), Le Virgile travesty en vers bvrlesqves… (Paris: G. de Lvyne, 1648- ). Vol. 1 of 7. Frontispiece by F. C.,  Junius Morgan Collection 2945.311.Fre648.2

 

Roscoe “Roc” R. Semmel Identified

Thanks go to Eric White, who identified a pen and ink drawing in the Graphic Arts Collection as the work of cartoonist Roscoe “Roc” R. Semmel (1888-1913). Semmel was the oldest of three children born to Robert J. and Hattie Semmel in Washington, PA. His father is listed as a “coach painter.” For more about that, see: F.B. Gardner, The Carriage Painters’ Illustrated Manual: containing a treatise on the art, science, and mystery of coach, carriage, and car painting including the latest improvements in fine painting, gilding, bronzing, staining, varnishing, polishing, copying, lettering, scrolling, and ornamentation (New York: Fowler & Wells, 1882).

Roc Semmel went to Slatington High School and then, the School of Industrial Art in Philadelphia before taking a job of a school teacher in Slatington, PA. “… his love of art was strong, and after moving to this city, a couple of years ago, he did some cartoon work for the Chronicle & News. His work attracted attention and he was offered a berth with the Harrisburg Telegraph and while there the Rochester Herald made a bid for his services and he is now doing great work on this paper.” —The Allentown Morning Call October 5, 1911

In 1911, Semmel married Florence C. Lentz (1893-1954) but sadly, he was diagnosed with tuberculosis and they moved almost immediately to Tucson, Arizona, for his treatment. Roc Semmel died there in August of 1913 at the young age of 25. Below is another example of his work:


Roscoe “Roc” R. Semmel (1888-1913), “Well I think the fans are convinced…”, ca. 1910. Pen and ink drawing. Graphic Arts Collection

Opere del signor Piranesi, che sono state pubblicate fino all’anno 1762

Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720-1778), Opere del signor Piranesi: che sono state pubblicate fino all’anno 1762. E che si vendono presso il medesimo nel palazzo del sig. conte Tomati, a strada Felice vicino alla Trinità de’ Monti, a’ seguenti prezzi (Roma: Piranesi, 1762). 1 letterpress sheet, Italian and French. 31 x 21 cm. Graphic Arts Collection.

The Graphic Arts Collection is fortunate to have acquired an early printed catalogue of works published “until the year 1762” by Giovanni Battista Piranesi. Making it even more of a treasure is a handwritten addition (presumably Piranesi’s own hand) in the right column list of the “Views of Rome” up to n. 60 “Del Pantheon, paoli tre.” The following view “Del Tempio della Sibilla in Tivoli” [“Of Sibyl’s Temple in Tivoli”] has been added in manuscript.

recto
verso

This catalogue is not unlike the later sheet in the collection of the Getty Research Institute. Each catalogue, at Princeton and the Getty, has text in Italian and French to expand Piranesi’s audience and hopefully his sales.Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720-1778), Opere del cavalier Piranesi: che si vendono sciolte il medismo nel palazzo del. Sig. Conte Tomati a strada Felice … [Rome : G. Piranesi, 1778?]. 1 letterpress sheet, Italian and French; 33 x 22 cm. Getty Research Institute

 

Whether or not Piranesi studied printmaking in Venice, it is certain that soon after his arrival in Rome in 1740, he apprenticed himself briefly to Giuseppe Vasi, the foremost producer of the etched views of Rome that supplied pilgrims, scholars, artists, and tourists with a lasting souvenir of their visit. Quickly mastering the medium of etching, Piranesi found in it an outlet for all his interests, from designing fantastic complexes of buildings that could exist only in dreams, to reconstructing in painstaking detail the aqueduct system of the ancient Romans. The knowledge of ancient building methods demonstrated by Piranesi’s archaeological prints allowed him to make a name for himself as an antiquarian—his Antichità Romane of 1756 won him election to the Society of Antiquarians of London. . . . Given his admiration for Rome and his contentious nature, Piranesi could hardly refrain from entering into the debate at mid-century over the relative merits of Greek and Roman art. Here, too, etching served him well as a means of supporting his arguments. His Delle magnificenza ed architettura de’ Romani of 1761 advanced the view, shared by other scholars, that the Romans had learned not from the Greeks—as British and French scholars had begun to argue—but from the earlier inhabitants of Italy, the Etruscans. Piranesi used his knowledge of ancient engineering accomplishments to defend the creative genius of the Romans, but devoted even more space to a celebration of the richness and variety of Roman ornament. — Thompson, Wendy. “Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720–1778)”. In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000–. http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/pira/hd_pira.htm (October 2003)

We have not been able to identify the enormous watermark that is nearly the size of the entire sheet. Andrew Robinson notes “Although I have now catalogued over 60 watermarks on different Piranesi papers, I am only tentatively confident about my fixing of their dates.” Hopefully a better image of this new mark can be made, which will lead to further scholarship.

Our sheet will be included this fall in the Firestone Library exhibition, Piranesi on the Page. https://library.princeton.edu/news/general/2020-02-13/puls-upcoming-exhibition-piranesi-page-reveals-art-architects-books. The exhibition is curated by Heather Hyde Minor, professor, University of Notre Dame, and Carolyn Yerkes, associate professor, Princeton University. Piranesi Unbound, a book associated with the exhibition written by the curators, is available from the Princeton University Press.