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450 €

Réf : 74618

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Alfons MUCHA

Couverture de L'Estampe Moderne n°21 January 1899

Imprimerie Champenois pour CH. Masson & H. Piazza, Paris Janvier 1899, 41x56cm, une feuille.

Cover of L'Estampe Moderne n°21 January 1899

L'Estampe Moderne, Imprimerie Champenois pour CH. Masson & H.Piazza, Paris January 1899, 41 x 56 cm, one leaf

Original large margin print in black and white serving as the cover of the famous monthly publication Estampe Moderne. Entirely printed in black and white, our print is the cover of the rare collection in a large-margin luxury print of the first year of publication. Artist's signature on the board and number of the luxury print added in pencil.
A magnificent monthly French publication published between May 1897 and April 1899, L'Estampe moderne comprised unpublished chromolithographs which, unlike other magazines such as Les Maîtres de l'Affiche and as is stipulated on the protective tissue, were specially made for the magazine by each artist. There are thus 100 prints that appeared in total, covering the major artistic movements of the late 19th century: Symbolism, Art Nouveau, the Pre-Raphaelites, Orientalism and the Belle Epoque. Each delivery of four prints was printed with 2000 copies and sold for 3.50F, with 100 on Japan offered for 10F. Henri Piazza also planned a high-luxury confidential print: 50 copies with wide margins on Japan and 50 in black and white at the considerable price of 30F.
French collector's interest in artistic posters grew from the beginning of the 1890s. Octave Uzanne invented the term “affichomanie” (“poster-mania”) for this growing interest. The poster, originally common-place and plastered across the streets of the capital, then became an object of art and its ephemeral medium precious and dedicated to conservation.
Piazza decided to remove the poster from its advertising role and elevate it to the rank of a work of art in its own right, in the same way as the luxury illustrated book. Thus, he composed a prestigious collection of entirely original works, by the most well-known 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.

The publisher also included in his project a Czech artist, newly arrived in Paris, Alfons Mucha “qui s'est révélé depuis peu en France et qui a conquis d'emblée une si grande place dans la faveur du public. Comme dans ses affiches, que tout le monde connaît et recherche, il nous montre ici les ressources variées de son talent multiple et sûr de dessinateur, de décorateur et de coloriste.” “who has recently emerged in France and who has straightaway conquered a significant place in the public's favour. As in his posters, that everyone knows and desires, he shows us here the varied resources of his multiple and sure talent as an artist, decorator and colourist.” (caption printed on the Salomé protective tissue). Incidentally, it is also to him that the first premium of the magazine will be entrusted, offered “à tous les souscripteurs des douze livraisons annuelles de L'Estampe moderne” “to all the subscriber of the twelve annual deliveries of L'Estampe moderne” as well as the famous illustration of the covers.

A very beautiful copy.

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