Original Etchings for Texts by Buffon (Eaux-fortes originales pour des textes de Buffon)
Artist: Pablo Picasso (Spanish (active France), 1881-1973)
Publisher: Martin Fabiani, éditeur, Paris, 1942
Printer: etchings: Roger Lacourière, [Paris]; text: Fequet et Baudier, [Paris]
Author: Georges Louis Leclerc, comte de Buffon (French, 1707-1788)
Date: 1942
Dimensions:
Slipcase: H: 15 1/16 in. (383 mm); W: 11 7/16 in. (290 mm); Depth: 2 in. (51 mm).
Book: H: 14 3/4 in. (374 mm); W: 11 1/4 in. (286 mm); Depth: 1 9/16 in. (40 mm).
Page (untrimmed): H: 14 5/8 in. (371 mm); W: 11 in. (279 mm).
Medium: Illustrations: lift ground aquatint, etching, and drypoint.
Text: letterpress in black with red (typeface: Deberny & Peignot Garamont).
Paper: Vidalon cream wove, watermarked with the signature of Ambroise Vollard.
Classification: Books
Credit Line: Gift of Molly and Walter Bareiss in honor of Barbara K. Sutherland
Object number: 1984.887
Label Text:Georges Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon, was an influential 18th-century French naturalist and mathematician. He published an ambitious Natural History in 36 volumes beginning in 1749. Originally meant to cover animals, plants, and minerals, Buffon was only able to complete volumes on animals and minerals.
In 1936 Pablo Picasso was commissioned by art dealer and publisher Ambroise Vollard to create 40 etchings for a special limited edition volume of excerpts from Buffon’s texts on animals. Picasso studied and partially paraphrased the original 18th-century illustrations for Buffon’s publication, but his images of animals and birds were done in a lively, spontaneous style (one not always particularly concerned with accurately describing every detail of his subjects), as seen in this print of two nesting European Goldfinches.
Ambroise Vollard commissioned Picasso to illustrate excerpts from the 44-volume HISTORIES NATURELLE (1749-1788) by the French naturalist Buffon. Picasso began work on the series in 1936, but when Vollard died in a car accident in 1939, the unfinished project fell to Vollard's associate and successor Fabiani to complete. Under the printer Lacouriere's guidance, Pacasso brilliantly mastered all the nuances of the sugar lift-ground technique of aquatint, which permitted him both to draw freely and to create a variety of textures. Picasso's utterly engaging pictures of domestic and wild creatures, including the horse, bull, cat, monkey, ostrich, rooster, bee, butterfly, and toad, have made this book rank as one of the great animal books of the 20th century.
In 1936 Pablo Picasso was commissioned by art dealer and publisher Ambroise Vollard to create 40 etchings for a special limited edition volume of excerpts from Buffon’s texts on animals. Picasso studied and partially paraphrased the original 18th-century illustrations for Buffon’s publication, but his images of animals and birds were done in a lively, spontaneous style (one not always particularly concerned with accurately describing every detail of his subjects), as seen in this print of two nesting European Goldfinches.
Ambroise Vollard commissioned Picasso to illustrate excerpts from the 44-volume HISTORIES NATURELLE (1749-1788) by the French naturalist Buffon. Picasso began work on the series in 1936, but when Vollard died in a car accident in 1939, the unfinished project fell to Vollard's associate and successor Fabiani to complete. Under the printer Lacouriere's guidance, Pacasso brilliantly mastered all the nuances of the sugar lift-ground technique of aquatint, which permitted him both to draw freely and to create a variety of textures. Picasso's utterly engaging pictures of domestic and wild creatures, including the horse, bull, cat, monkey, ostrich, rooster, bee, butterfly, and toad, have made this book rank as one of the great animal books of the 20th century.
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