Gustave Dore: biography, illustrations, creativity, date and cause of death

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

Gustave Dore's illustrations are known all over the world. He designed many book editions of the 19th century. Especially popular were his engravings and drawings for the Bible. Perhaps this artist is the most famous illustrator in the history of printing. However, not everyone knows that Dore never received an art education, and he signed his first contract with a publishing house at a salary of 5,000 francs per annum when he was 15 years old. His fame as an illustrator was overshadowed by the fact that the artist was also a talented painter and sculptor. The article offers a history and a list, as well as images of some of the works of this outstanding master.

Childhood

Gustave Doré was born on January 6, 1832, on Rue Noué Blay in Strasbourg, the son of Jean-Philippe Doré, a bridge engineer. Endowed with a keen sense of observation, the boy from childhood showed an outstanding imagination and an unusual talent for drawing. His first sketchbookdated 1842 (Gustave was ten years old), demonstrates the amazing professionalism of a child: the presence of a title page, captions for illustrations and a table of contents. In a number of drawings, the boy applied the method of anthropomorphism, transferring human images to other animated beings, for example, animals. Even then, his drawings displayed a humorous and lively manner, characteristic of the future artist.

Training period

In 1840, Gustave's father, having received the position of chief engineer of the Corps of Bridges, Waters and Forests, was appointed to the department of Ain, and the whole family moved to the city of Bourg-en-Bresse. There Gustave Dore enters the Royal College and becomes one of the most successful students. However, he stands out most for his extraordinary caricatures and drawings. The boy in the detailed street scenes reflects the world around him Burg. He is inspired by the work of illustrators-cartoonists Cham, Grandwyn and Rodolphe, considered the theorist and the first creator of the art of comics. The style of the young Dore becomes more refined, his previously rigid line acquires flexibility and sensuality. When Gustave was 13 years old (1845), one of the publishers of Bourg-en-Bresse printed three of his lithographs, which became the earliest published works.

First work and released album

In 1847, the fifteen-year-old Doré moved with his mother to Paris, where he entered the Lycée Charlemagne (Charlemagne) and began to work oncaricatures of his "Diary for a Laugh". He shows the drawings to Charles Philipon, a Parisian publisher, master of political satire and director of the popular magazines Caricature and Charivari. The publisher offers Dora a three-year contract and a page for his drawings in the weekly Le Journal. The young man created 1379 sketches for the newspaper, and it became a good practice for him with decent pay.

The young man soon becomes a prominent cartoonist in the publishing house, his images are distinguished by graphic innovation and sharp irony. But in an effort to please both the intellectual and the ruling circles, and also to avoid scandals, he avoids political and social topics.

His first album of lithographs, The Labors of Hercules, interpreting ancient mythology, was published in 1847 by Aubert & Cie. Each page contained no more than three images with short captions emphasizing the comical nature of the plot. Influenced by illustrator Rodolphe Topfer, Gustave Doré's drawings for this series created a coherent caricature narrative that gave the impression of continuity and movement. After the release of the album and work in Le Journal, the artist quickly became famous and in 1848 he performed with two pen drawings at the Paris Salon. After his father's death (1849), he lived with his mother until her death in 1879.

Road to Fame

In 1851, two Doré albums were published by Aubert & Cie, one of which -The Gratitude of Pleasure is today one of the first French comics. In his technique, the illustrator used a lithographic pencil.

Since 1851, Gustave Dore exhibits his paintings and sculptures on a religious theme for the first time. He contributes to various magazines, including Journal pour tou. In 1854, the publisher Joseph Bry publishes Rabelais, illustrated with hundreds of engravings by Doré. In 1873, Gustave will release another version of the illustrations for the works of this greatest French satirist.

In 1854, under the editorship of Joseph Bry, the book "Paris menagerie" was published about the life of the capital with 99 grotesque drawings and 14 engravings by Gustave Dore. But this low-cost edition with poor print quality and a modest format did not match the high ambitions of the artist. Becoming more and more famous, between 1852 and 1883 he illustrated more than 120 books, which appeared first in France, then in England, Germany and Russia.

History of Holy Russia

The book was published during the Crimean campaign in 1854, it contained more than 500 images and was considered strong political propaganda. It was Doré's first large-scale work, and became his only political and last album of satire. The artist, in a picturesque caricature form, acted as an illustrator and narrator of the dramatic history of Russia, a country against which France and England took military action. The album was created in the context of a broad nationalist movement of the beginningCrimean War and revived the Western cliché of Russian "barbarism". With the help of amazing graphic tricks, funny images and witty captions, Dore depicts the history of Russia, very bloody and cruel, from its origins to the era of the contemporary artist. But the comical nature of the war scenes, massacres and torture causes only a smile, not horror. The publication received incredible fame in France immediately after its publication.

Hone your skills

In 1856, Gustave Doré's creative breakthrough in the graphic art of the print takes place. Illustrating Grenier's poem "The Wandering Jew", set to music by Pierre Dupont, the artist improves the technique of colored woodcuts. His innovations made it possible to paint with paint wash directly on the wood of the board and achieve an infinite palette of tones, very close to painterly effects. Each such plate with an image and a short line from a poem has become a work of art. This work is considered progressive in the history of engraving, and it deservedly gained great public success.

Fed up with cartoons and cartoons for the news, the talented engraver and artist Gustave Doré is determined to express his talents in illustrations for great works of literature. Wanting to display them in the same format as The Wandering Jew, he compiles a list of thirty book masterpieces, among which are Dante's Inferno, Don Quixote, Perro's fairy tales, the works of Homer, Virgil, Aristotle, Milton, Shakespeare. Publishers refuse to make these luxurious publications because they must be too expensive. Doré works on engravings for Inferno from Dante's Divine Comedy and publishes them independently in 1861. The success of the publication exceeded all expectations, which can be summarized by one of the reviews: “The author (Dante) is crushed by the draftsman. More than Dante Illustrated by Doré is Doré illustrating Dante.”

Peak of success

The 1860s were the busiest years in the work of Gustave Dore. The decade began with the fact that on August 13, 1861 the artist was awarded the Order of the Legion of Honor. This was followed by a trip to Spain in 1861 and 1862 with Baron Deville, which resulted in a series of notes with drawings by Doré "Travels in Spain" and "Fighting Bulls", published from 1862 to 1873 in the journal Le Tour du monde. Gustave Dore worked for quite a long time on illustrations for the Bible, which was published in 1866 and became the most world-famous masterpiece of the artist. In addition, over the course of a decade, he created stunning images for such great works:

• Shakespeare's The Tempest (1860) with five engravings;
• "Hell" (1861) with 76 images, "Purgatory and Paradise" (1868) with 60 illustrations for Dante's "Divine Comedy";
• The Adventures of Munchausen by Burger (1862) with 158 images;
• Don Quixote by Cervantes (1863) with 377 illustrations;
• Atala by Chateaubriand (1863) with 44 drawings;
• "Hunting for lions and panthers in Africa" Benjamin Gastineau (1863) with 17 engravings ontree;
• "Sinbad the Sailor" (1865) with 20 illustrations;
• "Captain Fracasse" Gauthier (1866) with 60 drawings;
• Hugo's Toilers of the Sea (1867) with 22 illustrations;
• 9 Tales from Charles Perrault (1867);
• Lafontaine's fables (1868) with 248 drawings;
• Idylls of the King by Tennyson (1868) with 37 prints.

Painting

Throughout his creative career, Dore was distinguished equally by his penchant for illustration and painting, seeing no incompatibility between them. He creates large canvases such as Dante in the Ninth Circle of Hell (1861), The Riddle or Christ Leaving the Praetorium (1867-1872). Most critics reproach the artist for the fact that his painting is only an enlarged illustration with the composition inherent in Dora, the general plan, decor and posing of the characters. This judgment had a negative effect on Dore, who despaired of being recognized as a painter.

English period

The fame of Doré's prints and drawings is spreading throughout Europe. The artist met with great success at the London exhibition held in 1869. He stays in London for several months to create a graphic image of the British capital for Grant & Co. His art of composition reached its peak in the design of London: A Pilgrimage by William Blanchard. And the graphics for Samuel Coleridge's poem The Rime of the Ancient Mariner (1875) is one of the artist's greatest masterpieces.

Illustrated by Gustave Doré from 1872 to the endthe life of the master were decorated with such works:

• London: A Pilgrimage by William Blanchard (1872), 180 images;
• Milton's Paradise Lost (1874), 50 illustrations;
• London by Luis Hainault (1876), 174 prints;
• "History of the Crusades" Michaud (1877), 100 prints;
• Frantic Roland by Ariosto (1878), 668 illustrations;
• The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe (1883), 23 engravings.

It is not known why, but contrary to what is sometimes written, Dore did not illustrate any of the works of Jules Verne.

Death

Gustave Dore died of a heart attack at the age of 51 on January 23, 1883. He left an impressive legacy that exceeds ten thousand works. His friend, French military leader Ferdinand Foch, organized a service in the Parisian Catholic Church, the Basilica of Saint Clotilde, a funeral in Père Lachaise and a farewell meal at 73 Rue Saint-Dominique.

In 1931, Henri Leblanc published a scientific study catalog-reason, listing 9850 illustrations, 68 musical titles, 5 posters, 51 original lithographs, 54 wash drawings, 526 pencil and ink drawings, 283 watercolors, 133 paintings and 45 sculptures by Gustave Doré. The Museum in Bourg-en-Bresse holds the largest number of works by this outstanding man: 136 oil paintings, drawings, sculptures.