Doré's London: All 180 Illustrations from London, A Pilgrimage (Dover Fine Art, History of Art)

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0486432726 ISBN 13: 9780486432724

Publisher: Dover Publications, 2004

London in the middle of the 1800s was a subject endlessly sketched by artists, studied by social reformers, and discussed by writers. This comprehensive collection of drawings by Gustave Doré, France's most celebrated graphic artist of the period, presents a panoramic portrait of that engrossing city — from fashionable ladies riding in a sunlit park to ragged wretches in a shadowy side street. Here are amazingly perceptive sketches of workaday London, busy market places, the Christy Minstrels, a waterman's family, thieves gambling, the Devils' Acre in Westminster, flower girls, waifs and strays, a wedding at the Abbey, provincials in search of lodgings, a garden party, prisoners in the Newgate exercise yard, stalls at Covent Garden Opera House, and many other scenes that capture the London of a bygone era.

From the Back Cover:

London in the middle of the 1800s was a subject sketched endlessly by artists, studied by social reformers, and discussed by writers. This comprehensive collection of drawings by Gustave Doré, France's most celebrated graphic artist of the period, presents all 180 drawings from the artist's 1872 classic presentation, London, A Pilgrimage.
A panoramic portrait of that engrossing city, the collection ranges from images of fashionable ladies riding in a sunlit park to ragged wretches in a shadowy side street. Here are remarkably perceptive sketches of workaday London, busy marketplaces, the Christy Minstrels, a waterman's family, thieves gambling, the Devils' Acre in Westminster, flower girls, waifs and strays, a wedding at the Abbey, provincials in search of lodgings, a garden party, prisoners in the Newgate exercise yard (a scene that so greatly impressed Vincent van Gogh that he copied it in a painting), stalls at Covent Garden Opera House, and many other scenes that capture London of bygone era.
Taken from a volume that is widely regarded as the illustrator's greatest single work, the drawings in this collection will delight Doré admirers and anyone fascinated by the many aspects of Victorian London.
Dover (2004) original publication.

About the Author:

French illustrator Gustave Doré (1833-83) began his prolific career at the age of 15, and his dramatic engravings have exercised an incalculable influence over latter-day artists. The remarkable scope of his work ranges from Milton, Dante, and the Bible to Rabelais, Shakespeare, and street scenes of 19th-century London.