Original Etchings for Texts by Buffon (Eaux-fortes originales pour des textes de Buffon)

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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)

Date1942

DimensionsSlipcase: 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).

MediumIllustrations: 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.

ClassificationBooks

Credit LineGift of Molly and Walter Bareiss in honor of Barbara K. Sutherland

Object number

1984.887

Not on View

Label TextGeorges 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.Published Referencescf. Bloch, Georges, Pablo Picasso: Catalogue de l’oeuvre Gravé et Lithographié, 1904--1967, vol. 1, Bern, 1975, nos. 328--358., reprs.

cf. A Catalogue of the Gifts of Lessing J. Rosenwald to the Library of Congress, 1943 to 1975, Washington, 1977, no. 2186

cf. Garvey, Eleanor M., The Artist & the Book, 1860--1960, Boston, 1961, no. 231, repr.

cf. Geiser, Bernhard, Brigitte Baer, Picasso: Peintre-graveur, vol. III, Bern, 1986, nos. 575--605, reprs.

cf. Goeppert, Sebastian, et al., Pablo Picasso, the Illustrated Books: Catalogue Raisonné, Geneva, 1983, no. 37, reprs.

cf. Hogben, Carol, Rowan Watson, editors, From Manet to Hockney: Modern artists’ illustrated books, London, 1985, no. 110, repr.

cf. Johnson, Una E., Ambroise Vollard, éditeur, Prints, Books, Bronzes, New York, 1977, no. 192, repr. p. 87

Symmes, Marilyn, "Illustrated books at The Toledo Museum of Art", The journal of decorative and propaganda arts, Miami, winter 1988, p. 68, repr.

cf. Wheeler, Monroe, Modern Painters and Sculptors as Illustrators, New York, 1946, p. 109

cf. Johnson, Robert Flynn, Artists' Books in the Modern Era 1870--2000: the Reva and David Logan Collection of Illustrated Books, San Francisco, 2001, no. 67.

Exhibition HistoryToledo Museum of Art, The Bareiss Collection of Modern Illustrated Books from Toulouse-Lautrec to Kiefer, 1984, no. 62, repr.

Toledo Museum of Art, Picasso as an Illustrator, 1988, no. 14, repr. fig. 5.

Toledo Museum of Art, in conjunction with the Norton Simon Museum, Picasso: Graphic Magician, Nov. 7, 1999 - Jan. 16, 2000, pages shown: title page, page 17 (the donkey, the monkey)

Toledo Museum of Art, Don't Feed the Books: Birds, Bugs, and Bestiaries Featuring the Molly and Walter Bareiss Collection of Modern Illustrated Books, 2001.

Toledo Museum of Art, Monkey Business, July 2 - August 30, 2009.

Toledo Museum of Art, For the Birds, April 13-October 14, 2012.