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Arabian Nights Illustrated
Art of Dulac, Folkard, Parrish and Others
By Jeff A. Menges Dover Publications, Inc.
Copyright © 2008 Dover Publications, Inc.
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-486-13903-6
CHAPTER 1
The plates
Will and Frances Brundage
THE ARABIAN NIGHTS, 1893
In the mid to late nineteenth century, the earliest color works to be printed on a commercial scale were produced through chromolithography. Not a direct reproduction, this technique relied on the interpretation by the lithographer to accurately reproduce the color effects of a painting by adding one color at a time to the image surface. The works from this 1893 edition of The Arabian Nights use chromolithography—as does much of the work of Frances Brundage (1854–1937). A prolific and popular American illustrator, she was well known for her postcard and calendar work in the early twentieth century. Children were a particularly strong focus for her, both as an audience and as subject matter. In 1886 Frances married artist William Tyson Brundage (1849-1923), and his name shares the credit on more than one of the plates in this group.
René Bull
THE ARABIAN NIGHTS, 1912
Bull was born in Dublin, Ireland, in 1872. His early artistic career had roots in London and Paris; his training in illustration advanced as he depicted war for numerous conflicts in turn-of-the-century Europe, India, Africa, and the Middle East. Bookwork marked his career from 1905 to just after WWI. His familiarity with Arab customs, due to his years in war coverage, provided Bull with an edge when working on The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám and The Arabian Nights. Among Arabian Nights volumes, Bull's is among those most prized for their illustrations, due to their consistently strong quality. Bull died in 1942.
Dalziel and Cooper
THE ARABIAN NIGHTS ENTERTAINMENTS, 1902
Thomas Dalziel (1823–1906) was one of four brothers who were among the best wood engravers of the mid-Victorian period in England. Engraving onto wood a drawing prepared by an artist was an integral part of the illustration process from the early nineteenth to early twentieth centuries. It required a skilled craftsman who possessed an interpretive eye and an understanding for the material. Dalziel occasionally created his own illustrations, many of which were included in the 1865 edition published by Ward Lock. The color plates published in this volume that accompany Dalziel's cuts are chromolithographs, done after the work of the English artist A. W. Cooper. They are among the earliest color illustrations for these stories.
Edmund Dulac
STORIES FROM THE ARABIAN NIGHTS, 1907 SINDBAD THE SAILOR; AND OTHER STORIES FROM THE ARABIAN NIGHTS, 1914
After Arthur Rackham, Edmund Dulac is perhaps the best known and appreciated of the Golden Age illustrators. Dulac, born in Toulouse, France, in 1882, moved to his adopted England in 1904. Like René Bull, he had a particular affection for and familiarity with Eastern subjects and styles. While Dulac was a child, his father had traveled widely, bringing prints from the East for the young Edmund to copy. An opportunity to work on his own extensive version of the Arabian Nights came in 1907, and the brilliant young illustrator used it to showcase his talent. The success of the volume for Hodder and Stoughton in London assured Dulac employment in gift books for years to come, and he returned to Arabian Nights themes in 1913 (Princess Badoura) and 1914 (Sinbad the Sailor). In later years Dulac designed stamps and documents for France, England, and other European countries. Dulac died in England in 1953.
Charles Folkard
The Arabian Nights, 1913
As an illustrator of children's books, Charles Folkard (1878–1963) possessed a long and enviable list of titles, but he was equally well known for his work on a British newspaper comic, The Adventures of Teddy Tail (considered by many to be a predecessor to Mickey Mouse). Among Folkard's earliest books was a liberally illustrated edition of Pinocchio, which became the definitive edition. His Arabian Nights, published in 1913, was one in a group of books he produced in a long-lasting and successful relationship with A. & C. Black. An active illustrator to the end of his days, Folkard continually worked with and returned to the subjects of nursery rhymes and children's tales.
h. J. Ford
The Arabian Nights Entertainments, 1898
A consummate draftsman and inker, Henry Justice Ford (1860–1940) primarily is remembered for his stunning illustration work on a twelve-volume set of "fairy books"—each titled with a different color—from around the world, collected and edited by Andrew Lang. This body of work kept Ford employed for twenty years; the first, The Blue Fairy Book, was published in 1889, and the last, The Lilac Fairy Book, appeared in 1910. Ford was a friend of the Pre-Raphaelite painter Sir Edward Burne-Jones, who shared his vision of romance in his visual storytelling. Ford's work on The Arabian Nights Entertainments was very much in keeping with his illustrations in Lang's Fairy Books, both in style and format. These books are in print today, largely due to the appeal of Ford's skilled renderings.
Thomas Mackenzie
Aladdin and his Wonderful Lamp, 1920
Carrying on a tradition that Aubrey Beardsley, Harry Clarke, and Kay Nielsen had begun in Art Nouveau book design and illustration, Thomas Mackenzie (1887–1944) would not equal their fame, but he did produce some true illustrative gems. The work Mackenzie did for Aladdin and his Wonderful Lamp is among his very best. Mackenzie studied at the Bradford College of Art, and later at the Slade, receiving his first commission for bookwork in 1920—Chaundler's Arthur and his Knights.
Maxfield Parrish
The Arabian Nights: Their Best-Known Tales, 1909
Maxfield Parrish (1870–1966) was one of the premier American illustrators of the twentieth century. His work has a unique, almost photographic quality, the result of a combination of his approach to his subjects and his innovative painting techniques, many involving studio or landscape photography. His earliest work was for Frank Baum's Mother Goose (1897); shortly thereafter he began a career in high-profile, lucrative advertising work, with magazine and classic bookwork to follow. His Arabian Nights work appeared in 1909. Parrish's distinctive look and his use of "trademark" Parrish blue could be seen everywhere, and his work had tremendous public appeal. In the 1930s, seeking more personal satisfaction from his art, he turned to landscape painting; landscapes were always a prominent feature in his illustrations, and for the next thirty years this was the focus of his attention (though mostly for use in calendars). Parrish's work was highly influential on generations of illustrators to follow.
Louis Rhead
The Arabian Nights' Entertainments, 1916
British-born illustrator Louis Rhead (1858–1926) was still a student in Paris when the New York publisher D. Appleton offered him the post of art director. Earlier years encompassed a wide range of artistic paths—from ceramic design to poster work—but Rhead began to focus more and more on the illustrated book. After 1900, Rhead worked on a great many classic tales, from Swiss Family Robinson to Robin Hood to Treasure Island. His specialty was producing many images in line-art style, rather than executing a handful of paintings. Some of Rhead's projects have more than one hundred drawings, with a decorative element or drawing on nearly every spread. Louis occasionally worked with either or both of his brothers, George Wooliscroft Rhead and Frederick Rhead.
Charles Robinson
The Story of Prince Ahmed and the Fairy Perie Banou, 1913
The Robinson family—one of the most successful associations of brothers that the profession of illustration has ever known—had been involved in publishing and illustration for generations. Charles (1870–1937) was the middle of three brothers; Thomas (1865–1950) was his senior, and William (1872–1944) his junior; all three were very active during the Golden Age of Illustration. Charles's big break came in 1895, when he produced over one hundred line drawings for Robert Louis Stevenson's A Child's Garden of Verses. The edition was a great success, and it brought Charles new commissions in magazines and books. He became a staple of the gift-book market for the next twenty years, occasionally working with Thomas and William on a single project, though each brother would become successful on his own. Charles Robinson's work on the single tale from the Arabian Nights featured here demonstrates his penchant for working decorative elements into his illustrations.
Milo Winter
The Arabian Nights Entertainment, 1914
The American illustrator Milo Winter (1888–1956) was born in Illinois; he lived in Chicago and later moved to New York in the early 1950s. Winter illustrated many classic children's book titles in the early twentieth century, such as Aesop's Fables, Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tales, Gulliver's Travels, and this version of the Arabian Nights. His success with children's books would lead him to work for Childcraft books in 1947 as art editor, and in 1949 he became the art editor of the filmstrip division at Silver-Burdett.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Arabian Nights Illustrated by Jeff A. Menges. Copyright © 2008 Dover Publications, Inc.. Excerpted by permission of Dover Publications, Inc..
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