Philippe Kaenel

Though best known as the most illustrious illustrator of his era, Gustave Dore is nonetheless a highly diverse artist beyond said illustrations of wood engraving and pen/ink. Despite gaining fame across Europe, Russia, and the U.S., Dore was never quite recognized for his multi-talents during his living days same as his contemporaries such as Manet, especially at the Paris Salon.

This book is very well organized, grouping his work by categories and by time, providing numbers at every art photo. Each art had brief description with title, date, and medium as applicable. The book’s text further elaborates on the pieces as it relates to the chapter’s text. There is also a biography and a list of works.

Several chapters of the book is dedicated to his illustrations, given that dominated his (paid) work. Dore is very well known for his art of Cervantes's “Don Quixote”, Edgar Allan Poe's "The Raven", an English Bible, fairy tales
(such as the Puss in Boots), Milton's “Paradise Lost”, and Dante’s “Divine Comedy”. He also worked with Ivan Turgenev in Russia, who wrote “The name of the brilliant illustrator Gustave Dore is too illustrious to require further accolade” as a preface. Dore also published a commercially successful book of “London: A Pilgrimage”; the grittiness of the poor bleeds through the pages. Happily, all of these are well represented in the book.

Moving onto his other mediums, Dore is also an accomplished oil and water color artist. The lighting in his landscaping pieces has a photographic quality; I’m particularly fond of Loch Lomond of 1875, oil on canvas. He has also done religious pieces where his biographers has dubbed him the “preacher painter”. “In the 1860s a number of critics… considered these paintings melodramatic, theatrical and even phantasmagorical.” Too bad, I personally find these pieces to be the most ethereal and approachable of all religious paintings I have ever seen in all the lands that I’ve visited. Again the book provides good coverage of these.

Dore have had his commercial success but was always minimized by critics. Another medium, sculptures, also fell into this category. Perhaps it’s his whimsical theme, such as “Frolic (leapfrog)” with a knight leapfrogging over an elderly woman, 1881, bronze, or it’s his brutal theme, such as “Forever! Never!”, 1859, marble with death and a young girl that made him unpopular with the critics. A very eye-catching piece, “Roger and Angelica” or “Perseus and Andromeda”, 1879, bronze featured a very long spare into the mouth of Cetus. The balance between the upper portions of Perseus on a Pegasus over the base of Cetus with Andromeda is impeccable. Lastly, there is the monumental “The Poem of the Vine”. At 396.2cm tall, 208.3cm diameter, this phenomenal vase was dismissed as an oddity and was not allowed to compete as a sculpture in the 1878 and was instead placed in the decorative arts section. This piece made my jaw drop when I saw it. Luckily, I’ll be able to see it again in its permanent home in San Francisco.

This version of the book I have is an updated one vs. what is available in Amazon. It was purchased during my 2014 visit to the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa, one of only 2 museums (the other is Musee d’Orsay) that is lucky enough to have this amazing Gustave Dore exhibition – with pieces borrowed from over 50 museums around the world including private collectors. I gained a new appreciation to the words “Special Exhibition” from such an assembly of art.… (meer)