Category Archives: Acquisitions

new acquisitions

Espaces aveugles

The Graphic Arts Collection recently acquired one of the seventeen copies of Espaces aveugles (Blind Spaces) editioned by the filmmaker and visual artist Charles Billot. Best viewed in a dark room, the reflections from each location also add to the visual narrative.


Espaces aveugles is a book with no binding or spine, no introduction or index, no gutter or endsheet. The pages of Billot’s book are comprised of a series of photographs (inkjet on velum paper) to be viewed on a light box, which constitutes the book block. Readers are given the freedom to create their own unique narrative every time they page through the book. “Charles processes his film in complete darkness before exposing it to light. The edition, both a book and a work of art in itself, is a reflection of the artistic process behind the images it brings together.” https://www.instagram.com/storm_editions/


The book is published by the Brooklyn-based studio Storm Editions, which states “We create beautiful objects that are books.” According to their website “Storm Editions is born from love for books. And a need of new ways of interacting with art books. Founded by Nour Sabbagh Chahal, Storm Editions focuses on collaborations between multidisciplinary artists. We are an independent edition house.”

The prototype of Espaces Aveugles is dated 2016 but in truth, the edition was only recently finished and shipped. Special thanks to Nathaniel Wojtalic, who worked with Storm Editions to design and manufacture the light boxes.

Charles Billot, Espaces Aveugles (Brooklyn, NY: Storm Editions, 2017). Copy 11 of 17, numbered and signed. Graphic Arts collection GAX 2017- in process

Gustaf Nordenskiöld (1868-1895)

Gustaf Nordenskiöld (1868-1895), The Cliff Dwellers of the Mesa Verde, Southwestern Colorado: their pottery and implements ([Chicago: P. A. Norstedt & Söner, 1893]). Western Americana F778.N8q

Gustaf Nordenskiöld (1868-1895), Ruiner af klippboningar i Mesa Verde’s cañons / af G. Nordenskiöld; med talrika illustrationer efter originalfotografier af författaren ([Stockholm: P.A. Norstedt, 1893]). Western Americana 2014-0242Q

In his preface, translated by D. Lloyd Morgan and dated August 14, 1893, Swedish geologist Gustaf Nordenskiöld wrote:

The summer and autumn of 1891 I passed in Colorado, engaged upon investigations of the remarkable cliff-dwellings scattered in the canons of an extensive plateau, the Mesa Verde, in the south-west of the State. The present work is the result of those researches. It contains a description of the ruins, an account of the excavations carried out there and of the objects discovered.

In order to trace as far as possible the development of the cliff-dweller culture, I append a survey of the ruins in the South-western States akin to the cliff-dwellings of the Mesa Verde, a description of the Moki Indians, the descendants of the ancient Pueblo tribes, and an account, based on the relations of the first Spanish explorers, of the manners and customs of the agricultural town-building Indians in the middle of the sixteenth century. A special part of the work is devoted to a description by Prof. G. Retzius of the crania found during the excavations.

In order to give my descriptions of the ruins and of the objects found in them as great objectivity as possible, I have almost exclusively employed in the illustrations direct methods of reproduction. The ruins have been reproduced from my photographs, partly in autotype by Messrs. Angerer & Goschl of Vienna, partly in photogravure at the Librairies-imprimeries Reunies in Paris. The pottery, implements, etc. are heliotyped from photographs of the originals by Mr. Chr. Westphal of Stockholm. 14 August, 1893. G. Nordenskiold.

The photogravures were printed from Nordenskiöld’s own photographs at Librairies-imprimeries réunies. managed by Albert Quantin. The actual printer was probably the heliogravurist Paul Dujardin (1843-1913), who worked for Quantin and other publishers from his shop at 28, rue Vavin.

With thanks to our Lecturer in Visual Arts Fia Backström, here is the translation of the inscription in our volume:
To Gustaf’s teacher,

The assistant at the Royal national archive
Honorary A – Hammarskiöld
with many warm regards
from
Gustaf’s father

A Nordenskiöld.

‘Go wanderers on the road of life.
Your path ahead with quick steps
and measure your goal not your reasons
don’t measure your famn!’

Unpublished cut for “Tales of the Cordelier Metamorphosed”

George Hibbert (1757-1837), editor, Tales of the Cordelier Metamorphosed, as Narrated in a Manuscript from the Borromeo Collection: and in The Cordelier Cheval of M. Piron. With translations ([London: Printed at the Shakespeare Press by W. Bulmer and W. Nicol, 1821]). Graphic Arts Collection Cruik 1821 Robert. and Graphic Arts Collection 2018- in process.

 

The Graphic Arts Collection now holds two of the sixty-four copies printed of Tales of the Cordelier Metamorphosed, with illustrations by Robert Cruikshank (1789-1856). Our new volume seen at the top includes an unpublished Cruikshank cut, presumably rejected by George Hibbert (1757-1837) for the title page. This is Hibbert’s own copy where he kept both side by side.

These are first (and only) editions of the publication, printed for Hibbert, who was a wealthy Jamaica merchant, rare book collector, and an early member of the Roxburghe Club. The text consists of two tales, one a prose novella attributed to Michele Colombo and the other a French verse tale by Alexis Piron (1689-1773).

Hibbert writes to Roger Wilbraham:

The Italian Novel, which I believe to be now for the first time printed, existed, in Manuscript, in the Collection of the late Count Borromeo, of Padua; at the sale of which, in 1817, you made some interesting additions to your already valuable store of Italian Literature; and this manuscript, among other trifles, fell to my lot. It stands entitled, in the catalogue of that Sale, no.250. Novella di Gianni andato al Bosco a far legna, &c &c in 4to, MS, indeita, and it is there, upon what authority I know not, attributed, together with some preceding articles of the catalogue, to Michele Colombo.

It attracted my notice, from its close resemblance in the principal incidents of the story, to ‘Le Cordelier Cheval,’ or, as it is sometimes entitled, ‘Le Moine Bride,’ of Alexis Piron, a tale which I have always esteemed as not the least pleasant of that author’s facetious effusions; and suspecting that Piron, like La Fontaine before him, often gathered his subjects from some older record, I have looked in vain among the earlier novelists, for an original hint of this story. Whether the Italian be really such, or merely an imitation, or whether both the narrations be not borrowed from some preceding collection of facetiae, I will not pretend to determine.

According to Lowndes only 64 copies were printed, presumably distributed only to Hibbert’s friends. Hibbert’s copy has the bookplate of ‘Munden’, indicating the Munden estate, Hertfordshire, which he inherited in 1828. When Hibbert moved out of London in 1829, much of his book collection was sold at auction bringing a total of £23,000. This volume stayed in the family into the 20th century.

The Munden bookplate was engraved by Baron Henry John Fanshawe Badeley (1874-1951). The motto above is Respice, adspice, prospice (Look to the past, Look to the present, Look to the future). Below: Animum ipse parabo (I myself will provide courage).

 

Our first copy was a gift of Richard Waln Meirs, Class of 1888, donated to Princeton University Library in 1913. It has an armorial bookplate of Thomase Gaisford (1779-1855) and a presentation inscription to Philip Bliss (1787-1857) on front free endpaper: “Philip Bliss, British Museum, 1822. Given me by the Translator, George Hibbert, Esq. R. W., to whom Mr. Hibbert inscribes the vol. is Roger Wilbraham.”


Photogravures after Félicien Rops

From his bookshop at Passage Choiseul, 23-33, Alphonse Lemerre (1838-1912) sold this portfolio of ten provocative prints for the 1874 short story collection Les Diaboliques by Jules Amédées Barbey d’Aurevilly (1808-1889). The prints are described on the title-page, and by bibliographer Erastène Ramiro, as etchings but except for the frontispiece (a portrait of the author engraved by Raul Rajon (1843-1888)), they are all photogravures with additional etching after drawings by the Belgian artist Felicien Rops (1833-1898).

The copper plates were printed by Alfred Salmon (1825-ca. 1894), who was at this time in partnership with Adolphe Ardail (1835-1911), trading as Salmon & Ardail.

A second edition of Les Diaboliques was published in 1882 and these plates may have been for a third edition but no bound copy of the text with Rops’s plates is recorded. It is possible the project was never completed and so, the plates were issued separately. The nine Rops plates are Sphinx; Le Rideau Cramoisi; Le plus bel amour de Don Juan; Le dessous de cartes d’une partie de whist; A un diner d’athées; Le bonheur dans le crime; Le vengeance d’une femme; Postface; and Postface.

Félicien Rops (1833-1898), Dix eaux-fortes pour illustrer les diaboliques de J. Barbey D’Aurevilly; dessinèes et gravées par Félicien Rops ([Paris: A. Lemmerre, 1886]). One portfolio of ten etchings. Graphic Arts Collection GAX 2018- in process


See also: Erastène Ramiro, Catalogue descriptif et analytique de l’œuvre gravé de Félicien Rops, précédé d’une notice biographique et critique par Erastène Ramiro; orné d’un frontispice et de gravures d’après des compositions inédites de Félicien Rops et de fleurons et culs-de-lampe d’après F. Rops, Jean La Palette et Louis Legrand (Paris: Librairie Conquet, 1887).

La manière de se bien préparer à la mort = How to Prepare Oneself Well for Death


Engravings after Romeyn de Hooghe (1645-1708) and commentary by M. de Chertablon, La Manière de se bien préparer à la mort par des considérations sur la Cène, la Passion et la Mort de Jésus-Christ, (How to Prepare Oneself Well for Death by Contemplating the Last Supper, the Passion and the Death of Christ), avec de très belles estampes emblématiques, expliquées par M. de Chertablon (Anvers [probably Amsterdam]: George Gallet, 1700). Graphic Arts Collection GAX 2018- in process

In 1673, a series of engravings were commissioned from Romeyn de Hooghe for David de la Vigne’s Miroir de la bonne mort. Since then various editions have been published with extended and translated commentaries, and in some cases, new plates re-engraved by unidentified artists. We know the engravings for the 1700 volume, recently acquired by the Graphic Arts Collection, are after de Hooghe and not by him, since they are laterally reversed from the original.

These plates are not as crisp and clear as Hooghe’s originals. Even so, it is the edition that is in most collections and so, known to most readers.

In each scene, a man is dying. An angel appears with a depiction of a biblical passage, encouraging the man to prepare for death in a Christian manner. If you look closely, you might also find a devil in the shadows, tempting the man away from the Christian path.

“In the tradition of ars moriendi that began in the sixteenth century,” writes Yuri Long at the National Gallery of Art, “this book shows the path to a good death through a series of meditations on the Last Supper, the Passion, and the death of Christ. Each print depicts a man contemplating a religious image accompanied by an appropriate verse of scripture and textual commentary. Though de Hooghe was a Protestant, this work is aimed at a Catholic audience and demonstrates his willingness to take commissions regardless of his own political or religious beliefs.” — www.nga.gov/content/ngaweb/exhibitions/2014/romeyn-de-hooghe.html


A detailed interpretation of each plate in the 1700 edition can be found at the Melbourne Prints website, where Benita Champion notes,

“Five images depict the angel accompanying the man while a devil tempts him . . . . This motif is common in ars moriendi works dating from the famous fifteenth century ars moriendi block-book, c.1414-1418. . . . The fight for the soul occurs at the moment of death (Ariès, 1981, pp. 206-208). In the above example (p. 44) the devil tempts the person to despair by showing him his sins. The angel’s response is Matthew 9:2 ‘take heart, son: your sins are forgiven.’”

The frontispieces are more programmatic and individual. The first shows a skeleton (death) knocking at a door, holding an hourglass and scythe. Above the door is written ‘statutum est omnibus hominibus semel mori’ (‘it is appointed unto men once to die’) (Hebrews 9:27). Courtly activity fills the middle ground. To the left a man carries a cross up the hill, towards a ‘radiant pyramid’ with a serpent devouring itself (Scherer, 1973, p.8).

Below the skeleton is an entombment, with skeletons. This scene in fictive relief is framed by conventional foliage and ribbons, but also by skulls, crossbones and a decorative border in the form of vertebrae. Signs of decay abound in skulls and snakes. The road is placed behind this inevitable death. Superficially death conquers all, but the courtiers, if they follow Jesus and the cross, will come to the pyramid, signifying the ‘infinite holiness of the triune God’, with death, now rendered powerless, eating itself (Scherer, 1973, p. 8).”


See also:
Ariès, P. The Hour of our Death, trans. H Weaver, New York: Knopf, 1981.

Coppens, C. Een Ars moriendi met etsen van Romeyn de Hooghe: Verhaal van een boekillustratie, Verhandelingen van de Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Klasse der Schone Kunsten. Brussels: AWLSK, 1995.

Landwehr, J. Romeyn De Hooghe (1645-1708) as Book Illustrator; a Bibliography. Amsterdam: Van Gendt, 1970.

Landwehr, J. Romeyn De Hooghe the Etcher; Contemporary Portrayal of Europe 1662-1707. Leiden: A. Swijthoff, 1973.

Reinis, A. “Reforming the Art of Dying: The Ars Moriendi in the German Reformation (1519-1528),” St Andrews Studies in Reformation History. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2007.

Roth, F. “Pater Abraham a Sancta Clara, 1644-1709.” Monatshefte für deutschen Unterricht 36, no. 6 (1944): 288-303.

Scherer, W. F. “Through the Looking Glass of Abraham à Sancta Clara.” MLN 85, no. 3 (1970): 374-80.

It Seems Ridiculous

Endpapers front and back

I.N. Veroy and G. Ryklin, Kazhetsi︠a︡ smeshno: posvi︠a︡shchaetsi︠a︡ desi︠a︡tiletii︠u︡ Moskovskogo teatra satiry = Кажется смешно: посвящается десятилетию Московского театра сатиры [It Seems Ridiculous: Dedicated to the Tenth Anniversary of the Moscow Theater of Satire] (Moskva: Izd. Moskovskogo teatra satiry, 1935). Graphic Arts Collection GA 2018- in process

Several volumes on Russian film and theater history recently entered the Graphic Arts Collection, including the first and only edition of this photoessay on the Moscow Satire Theatre. Although 5000 copies are said to be published, the volume is rare. The photomontages, including wonderful endpapers, are by Chekryzov; the lettering on the title and the binding by L. Brodaty; and the graphics and illustrations by Brodaty, Ganf, Eliseev, Kukryniksy and Williams.

 

“On Triumphalnaya Square, between the Tchaikovsky Concert Hall and the “Aquarium” garden the Satire Theater is located. The building, which is over a hundred years old, got a modern look in 1960 upon the project of the architect V. Stepanov. The blind screen facade on the right was decorated with an illuminated square panel with the inscription “The Satire Theater”, on the left side of the façade planted theatrical masks were placed. The huge dome of the building testifies its age – it recalls the former famous circus of brothers Nikitin, built in 1910s by architect B. Nilus together with A. Gurzhienko.

Circus was located in the most popular amusement garden of Moscow – “Aquarium”, which thundered in different years throughout the capital for its theatrical programs. “Aquarium” was attended by thousands of Muscovites to watch the performances of the big-city and touring troupes of actors, acrobats, jugglers, trained animals, to have a dinner in the restaurant with live music in the shade of old trees and gurgling fountains.

Guests could also rise over Moscow on an air-balloon, make a keepsake photograph and admire the fireworks in the evening. “Aquarium” had a reputation of a “theatrical oasis”. The garden became famous for operettas of M. Lentovsky theater, ballet by Lydia Geiten, Frenchman Charles Aumont enterprise (he was the one who built the “Buff” and “Olympia” theaters), opera of Zimin theater and gypsy romances of the Blumenthal-Tamarin theatre.

In 1924 brothers Nikitin circus arena has been adapted for the first Soviet music hall, and in 1930 the building housed the Operetta Theater. In 1965 under the old dome a new hall was opened – the Satire Theater at last got a permanent residence after long process of moves.”

For more history on this Moscow institution, which is still in operation, see: https://um.mos.ru/en/houses/theatre-of-satire/


Clinker Press

The Graphic Arts Collection recently acquired a selection of fine press editions from Clinker Press in Pasadena, California. Andre Chaves runs this a private letterpress studio, with an emphasis on material relating to the Arts and Crafts Movement. He writes, “Within this focus I print subjects relating to art and literature. Although I do not do job printing, some special projects would be considered upon their own merits, as long as it falls within these parameters.” For a complete list of books still in print, see: https://www.clinkerpress.com/

“Clinker Press was started in 1996,” Chaves continues, “urged by Peter Hay, Carl Heinz and Helen Driscoll. Peter owned Book Alley, an antiquarian bookstore, and is an Oxford graduate who allowed me to use a small Kelsey press. Helen owned a paper store and now runs a very successful company called Invitesite. Carl teaches the History of design. We printed together and I provided the “garage” in a Greene and Greene house surrounded by ‘clinker bricks’. I first invested in a Chandler and Price platen and we started printing. Peter was the first to drop off, followed by Helen and then by Carl, although Carl continues to print on his own and Helen’s business is also about printing.”

Here are a few examples.

Vincent Huidobro “Manifestes”

Vincent Huidobro (1893-1948), Manifestes, Manifeste, Manifest, Manifes, Manife, Manif, Mani, Man, Ma, M. (Paris: Editions de la Revue Mondiale, 1925). Purchased with funds provided by the Program for Latin American Studies (PLAS). Graphic Arts Collection GAX 2018- in process.

We thought we had collected every volume published by the Chilean writer Vicente Huidobro (1893-1948) and then, this rare collection of manifestos turned up including a French translation of his best-known manifesto on Creacionismo (Creationism), as well as Manifestos manifest, The Poetry of Madmen, Tourist Advisory, and The Seven Oaths of the Poet among others.

For another volume in our collection, see: https://www.princeton.edu/~graphicarts/2010/08/vincente_huidobro.html

Printed (not drawn) verso of paper cover.

 

Huidobro was only 23 years old when he left South America for Europe. From 1916 to 1925, the young poet lived with his wife and children in Paris, quickly aligning himself with the circle of Cubist artists and writers. He remembered:

“It was the heroic epoch, in which we struggled for a new art and a new world. The thunder of the cannons didn’t drown the voices of our spirit. Intelligence stood its group, at least in France. I formed part of the Cubist group, the only one that’s had a real importance in the history of contemporary art. In 1916 and 1917, I published in Paris, along with Apollinaire and Reverdy, the magazine Nord-Sud, which today is considered one of the principal organs of the great struggle for revolutionary art in those days. My closest friends were Juan Gris and Jacques Lipchitz. Lipchitz and I were the youngest in the group. They called me the “blanc-bec,” which could be translated as the Benjamin of the family. . . .

Apollinaire would come to dinner on Saturdays. Max Jacob, Reverdy, and Paul Dermée would often come as well. Occasionally, Blaise Cendrars, Marcoussis, and Maurice Raynal would show up, just home from the front. Then I met Picasso who was returning form Southern France and about to put on the famous “Parade” ballet to the music of Erik Satie, another old and dear friend…”–The Selected Poetry of Vicente Huidobro (New Directions Publishing, 1981).

Nord-Sud (Sylvia Beach Collection Oversize 0904.682q)

Huidobro believed poets had a heightened state of consciousness, or super-consciousness, which he wrote about it in his Manifesto of Manifestos:

“Super-consciousness is reached when our intellectual capabilities acquire a superior vibratory intensity, a wavelength, a wave clarity, infinitely more powerful than ordinarily. In the poet, this stage can take place, can be triggered be a cause that is, at times, insignificant and invisible for the poet himself.”

Read: The International Yearbook of Futurism Studies, 2017, Mariana Aguirre, Rosa Sarabia, Renée M. Silverman, Ricardo Vasconcelos (Walter de Gruyter, 2017) SA NX456.5.F8 I589

Edward Steichen: The Early Years 1900-1927

Thrilling news. The Graphic Arts Collection acquired one of the remaining 1981 portfolios, Edward Steichen: The Early Years 1900-1927, published by Aperture in the United States and simultaneously at Saint-Prex, Switzerland by the Atelier de Taille Douce.

Here is a small taste but honestly, there is no digital image that reproduces the true beauty of these hand-inked and hand-pulled aquatinted and chrome-faced copper plates. The complete colophon information is reproduced below.

I asked the master printer Jon Goodman to say a few words about the project. Exerts are posted here and the complete statement can be read here: Jon Goodman steichen

 

Edward Steichen (1879-1973), Edward Steichen: The Early Years, 1900-1927 ([New York]: Aperture, Inc., 1981). Texts by Mary Steichen Calderone and Beaumont Newhall. Portfolio of twelve hand-pulled dust-grain photogravures printed by the master printer Jon Goodman. Graphic Arts Collection GAX 2018- in process.

“Edward Steichen: The Early Years 1900-1927 contains twelve photographic images made by means of the Talbot-Klic photogravure process. The chrome-faced copper plates were made by Jon Goodman and Richard Benson in Newport, Rhode Island. Eleven plates were made using the dust-grain technique and one plate (Three Pears and an Apple) using a specially prepared screen. The plates were hand pulled on the presses of the Atelier de Taille Douce of Saint-Prex, Switzerland. The texts by Beaumont Newhall and Mary Calderone have been set in Monotype Bembo and printed by The Stinehour Press, Lunenburg, Vermont, and are signed by the authors. The design is by Wendy Byrne. The edition is limited to one thousand examples and one hundred artist proofs. …This is number 984.” –Colophon

 

“The Steichen Portfolio was my first big project in photogravure,” writes Jon Goodman. “I started work on it in 1979 (I was 25). But it was a project that predated me. I was told that it was a project that Edward Steichen and Alfred Stieglitz had discussed while both were alive. In 1967 when Paul Strand’s “Mexican Portfolio” was re-editioned by Da Capo press in conjunction with a nascent Aperture (printed by Andersen Lamb Printing Co. of Brooklyn from plates made in 1939 by the Photogravure and Color Co.) Edward Steichen approached Michael Hoffman of Aperture about doing his project. . .”

Goodman continues, “I met with Michael Hoffman in New York in June of 1978 and showed him the work that I had been doing on my research which had primarily been done in Switzerland, first at the Centre Genevoise de Gravure Contemporaine and later at the Atelier de Taille Douce et Lithographie of St. Prex. He was quite interested and spoke to me about a couple of projects but primarily about the Steichen Portfolio which had been languishing for a few years.

Michael Hoffman called Richard Benson in Newport and arranged for me to go and meet with him at his home and studio. Benson had most of the equipment and facility needed to work in photogravure in his shop in Newport. He had an intaglio press that had been purchased with funds provided by Georgia O’Keeffe to make photogravures of Stieglitz’s work. I met with Benson and we arranged that I could come and work in his shop in the fall of 1978 on some of Aperture’s potential photogravure projects.”

“I returned to Newport in September of 1978 with the purpose of making some initial plates of Paul Strand’s work. I had access to Strand’s negatives through his association with Aperture and Benson had been Strand’s printer at the end of Strand’s life and knew what the images should look like. There was no funding for this work initially. It was thought that I would come to Newport for a few weeks but that turned into 3 years.

The initial Strand plates (“Gaspe’ Fisherman” and “Iris, Maine”) were a struggle. It was one thing for me to take one of my own negatives and make a photogravure plate and print but it was a whole other order of magnitude to take a negative of Paul Strand’s and make a photogravure plate and subsequent print that had a visual equivalency to Strand’s own print from that negative. The Gaspe’ Fisherman was made and editioned for the end of 1978 early 1979. Once it was established that I was a viable worker and able to try to make photogravures worthy of Paul Strand’s work and comparable to the photogravures from the Mexican Portfolio it was decided that we could proceed with the making of the Steichen Portfolio.”

“In the winter of 1979 I was sent to Munich to retrieve the material that had been provided to the printers there (Steichen’s printer had passed away by then). I had with me the “Iris” plate that I had made that fall in collaboration with Richard Benson. I asked the printers in Munich to make some proofs of that plate to take back to New York. I then went on to St. Prex Switzerland where I shared the work that I had been doing with my friends at the Atelier de Taille Douce and asked them to also proof the “Iris” plate in their manner of working.

I then took both sets of proofs of the “Iris” back to New York to show to Michael Hoffman. The difference in quality between the proofs made at the Atelier de Taille Douce and those from Munich was quite striking. There is a smoothness and a freshness to the photographic tones in the Atelier proofs while the Munich proofs were cottony and muddy. It was decided that the Atelier should edition the “Iris” plate while I went on to the making of the plates for the Steichen Portfolio.”

“It took me a full 12 months to make the 12 plates that are in the Steichen Portfolio. I learned a great deal in that time, multiple plates were made for each image before a satisfactory plate was accomplished. Then multiple proofs were made for each image, in different inks, varying both the transparency and the ink color for each. In the end after a great deal of deliberation we established the “bon a tirer” for each plate, which I then took back to the Atelier de Taille Douce in St. Prex.” Continue reading Goodman’s account here: Jon Goodman steichen
 

 

 

The Wars Occasioned by the French Revolution

“Britannia crowned by Victory, trampling upon the chains of France, holds in her right hand the Trident of Neptune, as Mistress of the Ocean, in her left hand Magna [Carta], whilst Fame is proclaiming to the World the Glory of her Arms, by pointing to some of her principle Battles inscribed on her Shield, which is supported by the Genius of Commerce; beneath are the Emblems of ancient and modern Warfare. London published by Rich. Evans…”

 


William Nicholson, The History of the Wars Occasioned by The French Revolution. Including A Sketch of the Early History of France, and the Circumstances which Led to the Revolution in that Country; Together with a Complete History of the Revolution in France, The War in Spain and Portugal, Russia, Prussia, &c. &c. Exhibiting a Correct Account of the General Congress at Vienna, the Escape of Bonaparte from the Isle of Elba, the Flight of Louis XVIII. from his Capital, the Defeat of Bonaparte at the Ever Memorable Battle of Waterloo, his Surrender to the British, and his Exile to the Island of St. Helena, with the Result of the Return and Re-establishment of Louis XVIII. on the Throne of France (London: Richard Evans Whites Row Spitalfields, 1816). 22 stencil colored wood engravings. Graphic Arts Collection GAX 2018- in process.

This history of the Napoleonic Wars from a British point of view is noted by some for the first account of a “diving boat” or submarine. Because the author is listed on the title page as L.L.D. [Doctor of Law], it can be assumed he is not the British portrait painter William Nicholson (1781-1844) or the British scientist William Nicholson (1753-1815) who wrote the multi-volume The British Encyclopedia, Or Dictionary of Arts and Sciences. The repetitive equestrian portraits of contemporary world leaders are so far unattributed (list below).





22 stencil colored plates:

1. Britannia, Crowned by Victory… [frontispiece].
2. Napoleon Bonaparte, Emperor of France. May 31, 1815.
3. Alexander 1st. Emperor of all the Russias… May 18, 1815. [Charles] Canton, del et sculp.
4. His Royal Highness, The Prince Regent of Great Britain. June 16, 1815.
5. Count Platoff, Hetman of the Cossacks. August 11, 1815.
6. Wm. Fred. King of Prussia. May 18, 1815. [Charles] Canton, del et sculp.
7. Field Marshall Von Blucher, Prince of Wagstadt. June 30, 1815.
8. The Duke of Wellington. June 29, 1815.
9. Lieut. General Sir Thos. Picton. Octr. 1815.
10. Lieut. General Lord Hill, K.B. Octr. 10, 1815. Meyron, del., [John] Romney, sculp.
11. Francis 2d Emperor of Austria. May 18, 1815.
12. His Royal Highness The Duke Of York. May 18, 1815. [Charles] Canton, del et sculp.
13. Lieut. General The Marquis Of Anglesea. Nov. 1815.
14. Lieut. General Sir John Moore, K.B. Dec. 1, 1815.
15. Field Marshall Prince Swartzenburgh. 1816. Meyron, del, [John] Romney, sculp.
16. Lieut. Genl. Sir Ralph Abercrombie. 1816,
17. The Battle of Waterloo. 1816. Engravd by [John] Romney, from a Painting by Heath.
18. Lieut. Genl. Sir Eire Coote K.B.K.C.&M.P. 1816.
19. Lieut. Genl. Lord Linedock. 1816.
20. Bernadotte Crown Prince of Sweden. 1816.
21. The Prince Of Saxe Cobourg. 1816.
22. The Prince of Orange. 1816.