10 Farbradierungen zu den Fabeln von La Fontaine
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Authors
La Fontaine, Jean de
Issue Date
1976
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Title on a large (19½" x 25") portfolio inside a solid case holding ten single colored etchings. Each etching signed, numbered (#33 of 100), and dated. The images themselves are 12½" x 15". Each is numbered 1 through 10 on the verso. At $1500, this was the most expensive purchase on this buying trip, though second to last year's most expensive, a 1547 early illustrated edition bought in London for £1575. I have noticed a single etching of the ten selling on the web for $250. I enjoy these large images. FC is an explosion of color and detail. But, I wonder, where is the cheese? "Camel and Flotsam" turns into a ship with three bird-captains. "Two Bulls" is a fierce Samurai swordfight; the frogs who suffer are not in the image. Are they perhaps watching with us? The protective cat eyes one sparrow, while the other is an uncolored outline. La Fontaine's "The Hare's Ears" has the frightened hare fearing that the lion will see his ears as horns and chase him out, as he has chased or eaten others. Dittrich has the hare in the foreground contemplating himself in a mirror. In the background a lion sits at his table with knife and fork ready. "The Two Goats" pits their confrontation against the peaceful landscape below them. "The Two Cocks" has a surprising image: a bird with arrows in his quiver rides a cock: the victor in the fight will be the loser. "The Lion" brought me to review La Fontaine XI 1: a young lion is born. A neighbor Sultan does nothing. The lion grows and soon must be feared, appeased; he cannot be conquered. About Dittrich's noble elephant, standing solitary and impressive, I wonder if this is the elephant that is so much bigger than the proud rat. Or is the elephant so concerned with his match against the rhinoceros that he misreads the mission of a monkey from Jupiter? Not in Bodemann.
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Galerie Schmücking
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13407 (Access ID)