Antar. Poeme Héroique Arabe des Temps Antéislamiques

Book Description

Paris: H. Piazza et Cie, 1898. L'édition d'Art. Fine. Folio. Four volumes: two volumes Antar, two on Dinét Illustrated in colour by E. Dinet Full binding by Canape (full morocco in burnt orange, cream, olivegreen, purple and brown, heavy gilt, raised bands on spine, inner dentelles, moirée silk doublures, all edges gilt) full morocco with marbled paper chemise, suede lined boxed. Original wrappers bound in.Georges Canape (1864-1940) succeeded his father J. Canape, in 1894. Like many of his contemporaries, he soon adopted a restrained version of the Art Nouveau esthetic popularized by Marius-Michel. Canape's own compositions often consisted of floral emblems within rather formal borders. At the annual Paris Salons, he offered the new style, blended with classical revival bindings, all executed with superb technical precision One of 25 copies (of a total edition of 300) on grand velin d'Arches paper Special edition with an additional (to the coloured ones) suite of plates in black on china paper (This suite separately bound). An absolutely stunning book. The illustrations by Dinet bring to life the legend of Antar, the triumph of good over evil. Dinet spent a large part of his life in Morocco, and he also converted to Islam. He portrayed the people of the desert and their culture as few artists have been able to do. To quote the publishers: "All of these epic illustrations were drawn by him (Dinet) in nature amongst the people of the Saharas, during the many long years he spent with them, in the mysterious solitude of this region where he has seen the life of the Arabs of the Desert, whose strange and wild poetry he has brought to us with his rare talent. Fights, dances, razzias, caravans, celebrations, hunts, etc., etc., all the parts in the life of the Nomadic Arabs, one will find amongst the compositions which accompany the text of each page of Antar .

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