"Beauty" - Lithographie originale sur Chine - L'Estampe Moderne

L'Estampe Moderne, Imprimerie Champenois pour C H Masson & H Piazza, Paris (july 1897), subject: 22.5 x 34 cm, plate : 40.8 x 55 cm, one leaf
Rare original lithograph by Edward Burne-Jones for L'Estampe Moderne, series no. 3, published in July 1897.
One of the 50 grand luxe proofs printed on China paper with wide margins, printed in brown ink, signed and dated by the artist in the stone. Embossed stamp of the publisher showing a child in profile to lower margin, laid down on a leaf of vélin paper with the numbered stamp of the tirage de luxe to verso, occasional spotting to margins.
A magnificent monthly French publication that appeared between May 1897 and April 1899, L'Estampe moderne comprised unpublished chromolithographs that, unlike those in other magazines like Les Maîtres de l'Affiche and as is stipulated on the guard sheets, were specially made by each artist for the magazine. There are thus 100 prints that appeared in total, covering the major artistic currents of the late 19th Century: Symbolism, Art Nouveau, the Pre-Raphaelites, Orientalists and the Belle Epoque. Each fascicule of four prints was printed in 2,000 copies and sold for 3.50F, with 100 on Japan paper sold at 10F. Henri Piazza also planned a very luxurious secret printing of 50 copies on Japan paper with wide margins and 50 in black and white on China paper at the considerable price of 30F.
This well-sized print is superbly printed on one of the most prestigious of papers: China. "Despite all its qualities, China paper, all too inconsistent, owes its reputation not to its own beauty, but to its particular affinity for printing ink. Its consistency, both smooth and soft, is more suitable than any other for receiving a good impression. It is this property that makes it sought-after for printing engravings...“ (Anatole France).
The interest of French collectors for artistic posters grew from the beginning of the 1890s. Octave Uzanne invented a term for this growing interest: affichomanie, or poster mania. The poster, originally not rare and posted up in the streets of the capital, thus became a work of art and its ephemeral background became precious and essential for conservation.
Piazza decided to extract the poster from its advertising role and to elevate it to a form of art, similarly to luxury illustrated artists' books. He thus put together a prestigious collection of entirely original works by the most fashionable European artists of the age: 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.
A fine copy in the artist's Art Nouveau style.