Blake (William) The Wood Engravings...for Thornton's Virgil 1821

Blake (William) The Wood Engravings...for Thornton's Virgil 1821, number XV of 15 out-of-series sets, from an edition limited to 150, 17 wood-engravings on Japanese Hosho paper, c.120 x 155mm., loose as issued in numbered card folders, with accompanying illustrated text booklet with introduction by Andrew Wilton and prospectus, both in original wrappers, together loose in original cloth drop-back box, gilt-stamped roan label to upper cover and spine, the first with small scuff to edge, tall 8vo, 1977. *** Superb reprinting of Blake's only wood-engravings from the original blocks in the British Museum. A collaboration between David Chambers and Iain Bain, they had to transport the 1884 Alexandra printing press into the museum in order to print the blocks. The result is a handsome affair and a distinct improvement on the rather poorly printed originals. Blake was new to wood-engraving and the original woodblocks were inadequately prepared and the engraving fine and shallow, as if for metal-engraving. As Bain and Chambers write in their note on the printing in the accompanying booklet, "...the results have been rewarding and demonstrate most clearly that impressions taken in the nineteenth century did little justice to the beauty of the blocks, and that hand printing from the original wood has in several respects improved on the excellent machine printing from electrotypes of the 1930s". (p.11)

Estimate:£2,000

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