Calbet

1897 · 73956 — Paris: Imprimerie Champenoispour CH. MassonH. Piazza 1897. Fine. Imprimerie Champenois pour CH. Masson H. Piazza Paris Septembre 1897 22 x 36 cm une feuille et une serpente Rare original color lithograph executed by Antoine Calbet for L'Estampe Moderne series number 5 published in September 1897. One of 50 deluxe proofs printed on Japan paper with wide margins artist's signature in the plate publisher's dry stamp representing a child's profile in the lower margin numbered stamp of the deluxe edition on the verso; engraving preceded by a tissue guard captioned with the artist's name title and a poem by Henri de Régnier; and another blank tissue guard. Magnificent French monthly publication edited between May 1897 and April 1899 L'Estampe moderne consists of original chromolithographs which unlike other magazines such as Les Maîtres de l'Affiche and as stipulated on the tissue guards were created especially by each artist for the magazine. Thus 100 prints appeared in total covering the major artistic movements of the late 19th century: Symbolism Art Nouveau Pre-Raphaelites Orientalists and Belle Epoque. Each issue of four prints was published in 2000 copies sold at 3.50F and 100 on Japan paper offered at 10F. Henri Piazza also planned a confidential deluxe printing: 50 copies on Japan paper with wide margins and 50 in black on China paper at the considerable price of 30F. This print in a handsome format is superbly printed in colors on the most prestigious of papers: Japan paper. Thick silky satiny and pearlescent it contributes to making each page a complete work in itself. Its quality of ink absorption and its affinity with colors also make it the ideal support for these very beautiful lithographs. The interest of French collectors in artistic posters intensified at the beginning of the 1890s. Octave Uzanne to describe this fever invented the term ""affichomanie."" The poster originally popular and pasted on the streets of the capital then became an art object and its ephemeral medium became precious and destined for preservation. Piazza decided to remove the poster from its advertising purpose and elevate it to the rank of a complete work of art on the same level as the deluxe illustrated book. He thus composed a prestigious collection of entirely original works by the most prominent European artists of the time: Georges de Feure Eugène Grasset Henri Detouche Emile Berchmans Louis Rhead Gaston de Latenay Lucien Lévy-Dhurmer Gustave-Max Stevens Charles Doudelet Hans Christiansen Henri Fantin-Latour Steinlen Ibels Engels Willette Henri Meunier Evenepoël Bellery-Desfontaines Charles Léandre etc. Handsome copy in Belle époque style. Imprimerie Champenoispour CH. MassonH. Piazza unknown