Travel, Atlases, Maps and Natural History

Travel, Atlases, Maps and Natural History

View full screen - View 1 of Lot 38. Redouté | Album de Redouté, [1824].

Redouté | Album de Redouté, [1824]

Auction Closed

November 12, 04:34 PM GMT

Estimate

50,000 - 60,000 GBP

Lot Details

Description

REDOUTÉ, PIERRE JOSEPH

Album de Redouté. Paris: Bossange, [1824]


FIRST EDITION, DEDICATION COPY (see provenance), folio (536 x 356mm.), stipple-engraved title after Redouté by Charlin, adapted from Les Roses, printed in colours and finished by hand with title text printed in gold within a wreath of roses, letterpress dedication leaf to the Duchesse de Berry from the publisher, 24 stipple-engraved plates printed in colours and finished by hand after Redouté by De Gouy, Langlois, Bessin, Charlin, Coutin, Talbeaux, Chapui, Tassaert, and Allais, publisher's printed yellow boards, front cover repeating the title wreath and with vignette arms of the dedicatee on an overslip, green half morocco folding-case, dedication leaf spotted and dampstained at lower left corner, one plate a bit frayed at fore-edge margin, some marginal browning and soiling, covers soiled and worn with minor loss, spine chipped with loss


THE DUCHESSE DE BERRY'S DEDICATION COPY OF REDOUTÉ’S RAREST WORK.


The Album is a coalescence of the greatest plates from Redouté’s previous works: Les Roses, Les Liliacées, Plantes grasses, and Jardain de la Malmaison. Each copy of the Album is unique, with varying motifs and numbers of plates. This copy contains 24 engravings, comprising: four plates from Les Roses (Rosa centifolia, Rosa Gallica Aurelianensis, Rosa Multiflora carnea, Rosa Clynophylla), thirteen from Les Liliacées (Iris Xyphioides, Iris Momieri, Iris pallida, Lilium Superbum, Lilium Candidum, Lilium Martagon, Lilium Penduliflorum, Amaryllis Formosissima, Pancratium Speciosum, Hemerocallis Caerulea, Amaryllis brasiliensis, Polianthes Tuberosa, Amaryllis Curvifolia), two from Plantes grasses (Crinum Erubescens, Methonica Superba), and five from Jardain de la Malmaison (Tulipa Gesneriana, var. Dracontia, Gladiolus Carneus, Harcissus Tazetta, Cyrtanthus Vittatus, Dianella Caerulea). The plates were reworked to feature in the Album, giving them an entirely new aesthetic.


Redouté was appointed "Master of Drawing" at the Museum of Natural History in 1822. Here he taught the theory and practice of flower painting. This attracted many students, often of royal or noble pedigree. Among his students were Queen Hortense, Lady Adelaïde d'Orléans (King Louis-Philippe's sister), Louise Marie (the future Queen of Belgium), and most importantly the Duchesse de Berry, to whom this copy is dedicated. It was early in his tenure as Master of Drawing that Redouté issued this anthology of his work: "Grâce à son enseignement Redouté était très connu. Il en profita pour mettre en vente un Album de Redouté, groupant 24 planches reprises de ses grands ouvrages antérieurs et dédicacé à la Duchesse de Berry" (Pierre-Joseph Redouté, Exhibition catalogue, Paris 1982). 


RARE. Only two other copies are recorded in auction records since 1946.


LITERATURE:

Dunthorne 237; Great Flower Books, p. 72; Hunt, Redoutéana 38 (but not in the Hunt Collection); Lawalrèe & Stearn 33; Madol & Stearn 26; Nissen BBI 1589; not in Pritzel or Stafleu TL2


PROVENANCE:

Marie-Caroline de Bourbon-Sicile, Duchesse de Berry, armorial bookplate (lower portion reading Bibliothèque de Rosny effaced); Christie's London, sale "The Property of a Nobleman", 4 June 2001, lot 41 


The Duchesse de Berry (1798–1870), was the daughter of King Francis I of Naples. She married Charles Ferdinand, Duc de Berry, in 1816.