The Gustavatory

August 31, 2009 1:05 PM

Gustave Dore's engravings for the Old Testament.High quality enough to print. New Testament is here, though it's not nearly as exciting. Much of the rest of his work can be found here (The Raven, Rime of the Ancient Mariner, The Divine Comedy and so on), albeit in varying resolutions.
posted by BlackLeotardFront (32 comments total)

It's all scratched and shit. Lamer than an iPod.
posted by Foci for Analysis at 1:11 PM on August 31

So hot.
posted by Baby_Balrog at 1:21 PM on August 31

G21. Hagar and Ishmael in the Wilderness

Ishmael was a sailor whereas Hagar was more of a land dweller. In the picture we see the result, a TKO by Hagar the Horrible over Ishmael in the fourth round.
posted by storybored at 1:23 PM on August 31

Goddamn could that man make some art.
posted by lekvar at 1:27 PM on August 31

They also make great doom metal album covers.
posted by The Straightener at 1:28 PM on August 31

Yeah, that guy could draw.

Nothing warms the cockles of my blackened heart like seeing a nice rendering of Zedekiah's Sons Are Slaughtered before His Eyes, or The Benjaminites Take the Virgins of Jabesh-gilead. And who doesn't want a nice print of The Fifth Plague: Livestock Disease hanging over your couch?

Dore was the man. He also did illustrations in a somewhat "lighter" style, for books like The Adventures of Baron Munchausen.

This is as good a place as any to give a shout-out to Franklin Booth.
posted by marxchivist at 1:40 PM on August 31 [1 favorite]

This is one of my favorite sites ever, I love this stuff. My faves among his are the ones to The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.
posted by gemmy at 1:44 PM on August 31

And lo, the post was good.
posted by phrontist at 2:04 PM on August 31 [1 favorite]

Holy shit, this is awesome! Thanks so much for the post!
posted by Pecinpah at 2:12 PM on August 31

Ishmael was a sailor whereas Hagar was more of a land dweller. In the picture we see the result, a TKO by Hagar the Horrible over Ishmael in the fourth round.

I'm delivering a drash (commentary on the Torah text) on Gen. 21 in a couple of weeks (on Rosh Hashana), so I'm getting a kick out of this thread...

oops wrong community. well, not really.
posted by yiftach at 2:22 PM on August 31

Great links. Not only was the man a wonderful artist, he could rock a scarf like no one I've ever seen.
posted by PunkSoTawny at 2:30 PM on August 31 [1 favorite]

Don't miss his work on Don Quixote, either. My favorite, which I'd like to see in a large print.
posted by jquinby at 2:49 PM on August 31 [1 favorite]

Last time I was in Paris, I ran across an original Doré print in either Carnavalet or Orsay. It was stunning. Not only was it a fabulous example of what he could do, it was huge, like five feet across. I wish someone would undertake putting all his work up in high quality digital scans.
posted by pashdown at 2:49 PM on August 31

I love Dore. Found his work while shelving books in grad school. So good.
posted by Ironmouth at 3:19 PM on August 31

> New Testament is here, though it's not nearly as exciting.

It definitely has its moments.
posted by The Card Cheat at 4:38 PM on August 31 [1 favorite]

To The Card Cheat:

Sweet!
posted by math at 5:27 PM on August 31

London: A Pilgrimage is worth a look (and a read, if you can get your hands on a copy of the entire work). Great post-- thanks!
posted by Heretic at 7:03 PM on August 31

Dore was ok, but I was a little bummed when I realized he didn't make all those lines -- the engraver cut the plate (his name is usually on the right), based on Dore's drawing. The astonishing Franklin Booth, on the other hand (mentioned above by marxchivist) conceived and drew his images, by hand, with pen and ink, to look like engravings. As a kid, he'd copy the engravings in magazines (the main method of reproducing images back then), thinking they were pen & ink drawings, and not realizing that engravers have various tools to create multiple, parallel line. He was able to create amazing gradations of tone with just a pen, and had a fantastic sense of design. If you've ever tried to do pen & ink, his stuff will take your breath away.

And I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the great Bernie Wrightson, who was a big fan of both Dore and Booth, most evident in his Frankenstein portfolio.

(Sorry if this is a slight derail. Marxchivist started it. I proselytize for Booth any chance I get...)
posted by Bron at 7:22 PM on August 31 [5 favorites]

His Paradise Lost is bloody amazing.
posted by hooptycritter at 8:01 PM on August 31

Sorry if this is a slight derail. Marxchivist started it.

I'll see your derail and raise you one....
posted by marxchivist at 8:44 PM on August 31 [1 favorite]

THANK YOU! This is the best thing ever. Dore is one of my favorite artists.
posted by archagon at 9:03 PM on August 31

I'm with you, Bron - I know, he didn't scratch it all out. But his vision is there, and everything was certainly directed and approved by him. Damn, Booth is awesome.
posted by BlackLeotardFront at 9:04 PM on August 31

I was familiar with the name Franklin Booth, but for whatever reason, never sought out his stuff.
Goddamn. Just goddamn.

Also, Doré is swell. I can easily lose an afternoon browsing through my cheapie copy of Divine Comedy engravings.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 9:15 PM on August 31

marxchivist: Yeah, I remember that thread...it's probably part of my huge stack of favorites I'm gonna get to any day now.

Gawd, I was a stone-cold Wrightson addict back in the day; tried to find out what pen nibs he used, the paper, what kind of ink. Saw something he did recently for a Stephen King book, it was...sad. Not good.

Back to Dore, looking through my copy of a "A Dore Treasury", you can really see the different hands involved in the creation of the pieces, some of the engravers were a lot more skilled than others. Dore was probably overseeing multiple craftsmen rendering his drawings. Which is not to take anything away from his magnificent visions -- I just always have a preference for the actual hand of the artist.

Now if we could just find some ultra-high-res Booth scans...
posted by Bron at 9:23 PM on August 31

We picked up a print of this a while back.

I love Dore.
posted by paisley henosis at 11:10 PM on August 31

I like how disconcerting his fairy tale animals are. They're contorted awkwardly, but unselfconsciously, into a human posture with next to no anatomical concessions made toward anthropomorphism.
posted by Phlogiston at 6:51 AM on September 1

Given how - for lack of a better word - prodigious the subject matter is, what has always most impressed me about Dore's work, beyond the superhuman draftsmanship, is how perfectly unified the compositions are.

Any biblical passage is virtually synonomous with subjective interpretation. For an artist to face and understand that irreconcilable fact, and still create works as manually and visually concise as these is an extraordinary achievement, and Dore is justifiably venerated for it.

Great post.
posted by Hickeystudio at 11:39 AM on September 1

Don't miss his work on Don Quixote, either. My favorite, which I'd like to see in a large print. - posted by jquinby


I have a massively large print of that, of course, in my library room. :) It's huge. I bought it framed at an estate sale 20+ years ago, and have moved it with me a zillion times. I love that print so very much.
posted by dejah420 at 1:47 PM on September 1 [1 favorite]

I have a massively large print of that...

...and art.com seems to have it. Excellent!
posted by jquinby at 3:00 PM on September 1

I loved the engravings that go with The Rhime Of The Ancient Mariner.

Another derail: Utagawa Kunihoshi
posted by jouke at 3:31 AM on September 2

Wow. From the Art.com caption: A child prodigy whose artistic talent emerged at age 5, [Dore] became France’s highest-paid illustrator by age 16. Remarkably prolific, he produced 10,000 engravings during his life and employed more than 40 block cutters.
posted by Bron at 7:44 AM on September 2

[Oh, and because I like you guys (and happened to have the files sitting on my hard drive): six hi-rez Booth drawings. 1200 dpi .tif scans, pretty good quality (but not from originals or anything). Be aware his stuff will moire onscreen, so viewing a print is better.]
posted by Bron at 9:49 AM on September 2 [1 favorite]