Gustave Doré


Paul Gustave Louis Christophe Doré was a French artist, printmaker, illustrator, comics artist, caricaturist, and sculptor who worked primarily with wood-engraving.

Biography

Doré was born in Strasbourg on 6 January 1832. By age 5 he was a prodigy artist, creating drawings that were mature beyond his years. Seven years later, he began carving in stone. At the age of 15, Doré began his career working as a caricaturist for the French paper Le journal pour rire. Wood-engraving was his primary method at this time. In the late 1840s and early 1850s, he made several text comics, like Les Travaux d'Hercule, Trois artistes incompris et mécontents, Les Dés-agréments d'un voyage d'agrément and L'Histoire de la Sainte Russie. Doré subsequently went on to win commissions to depict scenes from books by Cervantes, Rabelais, Balzac, Milton, and Dante. He also illustrated "Gargantua et Pantagruel" in 1854.
In 1853 Doré was asked to illustrate the works of Lord Byron. This commission was followed by additional work for British publishers, including a new illustrated Bible. In 1856 he produced 12 folio-size illustrations of The Legend of The Wandering Jew, which propagated longstanding antisemitic views of the time, for a short poem which Pierre-Jean de Béranger had derived from a novel of Eugène Sue of 1845.
In the 1860s he illustrated a French edition of Cervantes's Don Quixote, and his depictions of the knight and his squire, Sancho Panza, have become so famous that they have influenced subsequent readers, artists, and stage and film directors' ideas of the physical "look" of the two characters. Doré also illustrated an oversized edition of Edgar Allan Poe's "The Raven", an endeavor that earned him 30,000 francs from publisher Harper & Brothers in 1883.
Doré's illustrations for the Bible were a great success, and in 1867 Doré had a major exhibition of his work in London. This exhibition led to the foundation of the Doré Gallery in Bond Street, London. In 1869, Blanchard Jerrold, the son of Douglas William Jerrold, suggested that they work together to produce a comprehensive portrait of London. Jerrold had obtained the idea from The Microcosm of London produced by Rudolph Ackermann, William Pyne, and Thomas Rowlandson. Doré signed a five-year contract with the publishers Grant & Co that involved his staying in London for three months a year, and he received the vast sum of £10,000 a year for the project. Doré was mainly celebrated for his paintings in his day. His paintings remain world-renowned, but his woodcuts and engravings, like those he did for Jerrold, are where he excelled as an artist with an individual vision.
The completed book London: A Pilgrimage, with 180 wood-engravings, was published in 1872. It enjoyed commercial and popular success, but the work was disliked by many contemporary critics. Some of these critics were concerned by the fact that Doré appeared to focus on the poverty that existed in parts of London. Doré was accused by The Art Journal of "inventing rather than copying". The Westminster Review claimed that "Doré gives us sketches in which the commonest, the vulgarest external features are set down". The book was a financial success, however, and Doré received commissions from other British publishers.
Doré's later work included illustrations for new editions of Coleridge's Rime of the Ancient Mariner, Milton's Paradise Lost, Tennyson's Idylls of the King, The Works of Thomas Hood, and The Divine Comedy. Doré's work also appeared in the weekly newspaper The Illustrated London News.
Doré never married and, following the death of his father in 1849, he continued to live with his mother, illustrating books until his death in Paris following a short illness. The city's Père Lachaise Cemetery contains his grave. At the time of his death in 1883, he was working on illustrations for an edition of Shakespeare's plays. The government of France made him a Chevalier de la Légion d'honneur in 1861.

Works

Doré was a prolific artist; thus the following list of works is not complete and it does not include his paintings, sculptures, and many of his journal illustrations:
DateAuthorWorkVolumes / FormatIllustrationsPublisherRef
1854Gustave DoréHistoire pittoresque dramatique et caricaturale de la Sainte Russie, d'après les chroniqueurs et historiens Nestor Nikan Sylvestre Karamsin Ségur etc.1 vol.500Paris: de Bry
1854RabelaisOeuvres contenant la vie de Gargantua et celle de Pantagruel...1 vol. 4to.Frontis. & 15J.Bry Ainé, Paris
1855Honoré de BalzacLes Contes Drôlatiques425Société Générale de la Libraire, and in Le Journal pour Tous
1855Jules GérardLa Chasse au Lion1 vol. 12mo.11Librairie Nouvelle
1856Fierabras d'Alexandrie, Légende Nationale traduite par Mary Lafon1 vol in 8vo123Librairie Nouvelle
1856Mémoires d'un Jeune Cadet, par Victor Percival48
1856La Légende du Juif Errant1 vol. grand in folio12 :Image:Wandering jew title page.jpgMichel Lévy
1857Dante AlighieriL'Enfer70
1857 autumnEd. de La BédollièreNouveau Paris, Histoire de ses 20 Arrondissements1 vol in 4to150Barba
1857 autumnValéry VernierAline, Journal d'un Jeune Hommeone large pageDentu
1860–1862Thomas Mayne ReidL'Habitation du Désert1 vol. in 16mo60Hachette
1860–1862Ann S. StevensLa Fille du Grand Chieftain1 vol.15
1860–1862M. V. VictorFlêche d'Or1 vol.13
1860–1862E. S. EllisL'Ange des Frontières1 vol.10
1860–1862N. W. BuxtedLes Vierges de la Forêt1 vol.10
1860William ShakespeareThe Tempest1 vol. in 4to
1861Les Figures du Temps1 vol. in 12mo
1861Plouvier and VincentLes Chansons d'Autrefoisin 12moCoulon and Pineau, Paris
1861Edmond AboutLe Roi des Montagnes1 vol. in 8vo157Hachette and Co., Paris
1862SaintineLes Mythologies du Rhin1 vol. in 8vo165Hachette and Co., Paris
1862L'Abbé Léon GodardL'Espagne, Mœurs et Paysages2 vols in 8vo4 :Image:Moeurs et paysages title page.jpgAlfred Mame et Fils, Tours :Image:Moeurs et paysages title page.jpg or Paris
1862Malte-BrunLes États Unis et le Mexique1 vol. in 4toBrun, Paris
1862Histoire aussi intéressante qu'invraisemblable de l'intrépide Capitaine Castagnette, neveu de l'Homme à la Tête de Bois1 vol. in 4to43Hachette
1862Charles PerraultLes Contes de Perrault11
1862Aventures du Baron de Münchausen, traduction nouvelle par Théophile Gautier fils1 vol.
1863M. ÉpinéLégende de Croquemitaine1 vol. in 4to177Hachette
1863GastineauLa Chasse au Lion et à la Panthère1 vol. in 8voHachette and Co.
1863Miguel de CervantesDon Quixote de la Mancha translation by Louis Viardot2 vols. folio370Hachette and Co., Paris, and Cassell and Co., London
1863Les Contes de Perrault or in Spanish Los Cuentos de Perrault100+Hetzels. in Spanish by Ledouse
1865GastineauDe Paris en Afrique1 vol. in 12mo
1865A. MasseL'Histoire d'un Minute1 vol., 12mo
1866Victor HugoTravailleurs de la MerSampson Low and Co., London
1865E. EdgarCressy and Poictiers1 vol. in 8vo50+
1865Thomas MooreL'Épicurien in 8vo
1865Tom HoodFairy Realmin folio
1865QuatrellesLe Chevalier Beautempsgrand in 8vo
1865ChateaubriandAtala2 vols, grand folio80Hachette Edition
1866Théophile GautierLe Capitaine Fracasse1 vol. grand in 8vo60Charpentier
1866G. La BédollièreHistoire de la Guerre en Mexiquein 4to
1866Dante AlighieriThe Vision of HellLondon, Cassell, Petter, and Galpin
1867Dante AlighieriIl Purgatorio ed il ParadisoHachette and Co.
1866X. B. SaintineLe Chemin des Écoliers1 vol. in 8vo450 :Image:Le chemin des ecoliers title page.jpg Hachette and Co.
1866La Sainte Bible, according to the Vulgate, new translation2 vols. grand in folio241Mame, Tours; Cassell and Co., England
1866John MiltonParadise Lost50 PlatesCassell and Co.
1867La BédollièreLa France et la Russie
1867Les Fables de Lafontaine2 vols. in folio8 large and 250 small platesHachette and Co.
1867Les Pays-bas et la Belgiquein 8vo
1870Thomas Hood2 vols. in folio9 PlatesWard and Lock, London
1873New edition of Rabelais2 vols. in folioParis : Garnier; London: Chatto and Windus
1876Louis ÉnaultLondon1 vol. in 4to174 wood-engravingsHachette and Co.
1874Baron Ch. DavilliersL'Espagnein 4to309 wood-engravingsHachette and Co.; London: Sampson Low and Co.
1875Samuel Taylor ColeridgeThe Rime of the Ancient Marinerin folio39 engraved plates and 3 vignettesLondon: Doré Gallery
1875MichaudHistoire des Croisades2 vol. medium folio100 grand compositionsParis: Hachette and Co.
Alfred TennysonIdylls of the King
1877AriostoOrlando Furioso36 drawingsHachette and Co.
1884Edgar Allan PoeThe Raven26 steel engravingsLondon: Sampson Low and Co., New York: Harper and Co.

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