Librairie Romantique
Poster
1887 (Designed and printed)
1887 (Designed and printed)
Artist/Maker | |
Place of origin |
This poster belongs to a large collection assembled during the nineteenth century by Joseph Thatcher Clarke, whose wife, Agnes, gave the collection to the Victoria and Albert Museum in 1921. Clarke was one of the first poster collectors and organised several exhibitions of these works at The Royal Aquarium in London. In the introduction to one of the exhibition's catalogues, Clarke showed great foresight when he proposed that the medium would hold enduring appeal and significance:
"The finest posters are, indeed, not only exemplars of artistic originality, beauty, and excellence in technique, but actual records of the daily life and interests of the age. From these documents the future historian may derive the fullest information concerning our food (physical and intellectual), our clothing, our diseases, and our remedies therefor - in short, concerning our vocations, our amusements, and our morals. What would not the archaeologist be willing to give for a set of such documents, relating, let us say, to Pericleian Athens or to Augustan Rome?"
"The finest posters are, indeed, not only exemplars of artistic originality, beauty, and excellence in technique, but actual records of the daily life and interests of the age. From these documents the future historian may derive the fullest information concerning our food (physical and intellectual), our clothing, our diseases, and our remedies therefor - in short, concerning our vocations, our amusements, and our morals. What would not the archaeologist be willing to give for a set of such documents, relating, let us say, to Pericleian Athens or to Augustan Rome?"
Object details
Categories | |
Object type | |
Title | Librairie Romantique (popular title) |
Materials and techniques | colour lithograph on paper |
Brief description | Poster for 'Librairie Romantique' by Eugène-Samuel Grasset. France, 1887. |
Physical description | A young woman in a black dress with a white lace collar sits on a stack of books reading from a volume in her hands. Facing the woman, the moon rises over Notre Dame cathedral and a skull rests by her right foot. |
Dimensions |
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Marks and inscriptions |
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Credit line | Given by Mrs J.T. Clarke |
Object history | The blank rectangle in the lower left-hand corner of the poster provided a space for supplementary information to be printed on to the work - e.g. information about different publications. A duplicate poster includes text in this space, advertising the publication of 'L'Age du Romantisme'. |
Historical context | The poster references the gothic horror literary genre that became so popular in the nineteenth century. |
Subjects depicted | |
Places depicted | |
Summary | This poster belongs to a large collection assembled during the nineteenth century by Joseph Thatcher Clarke, whose wife, Agnes, gave the collection to the Victoria and Albert Museum in 1921. Clarke was one of the first poster collectors and organised several exhibitions of these works at The Royal Aquarium in London. In the introduction to one of the exhibition's catalogues, Clarke showed great foresight when he proposed that the medium would hold enduring appeal and significance: "The finest posters are, indeed, not only exemplars of artistic originality, beauty, and excellence in technique, but actual records of the daily life and interests of the age. From these documents the future historian may derive the fullest information concerning our food (physical and intellectual), our clothing, our diseases, and our remedies therefor - in short, concerning our vocations, our amusements, and our morals. What would not the archaeologist be willing to give for a set of such documents, relating, let us say, to Pericleian Athens or to Augustan Rome?" |
Bibliographic reference | Coutts, Howard and Claire Jones Toulouse Lautrec and the art of the French Poster. Bowes Museum, 2004. 53 p., ill. ISBN 0954818202. |
Collection | |
Accession number | E.183-1921 |
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Record created | August 8, 2007 |
Record URL |
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