OVER 400 VICTORIAN PEN AND INK COMIC STRIP ILLUSTRATIONS-J W...

Hammer

£460

OVER 400 VICTORIAN PEN AND INK COMIC STRIP ILLUSTRATIONS-J Warren Law (19TH Century) an important archive of over 400 individual pen and ink illustrations executed in the late Victorian period circa 1885-1895, with many original pen and ink copies of comic illustrations of the time to include. Teddie’s Buffler Trap (originally published in The Graphic Christmas Number 1890), signed to the last illustration JWL 22ND August 1891) Christmas at Little-Peopleton Manor- Kate Greenaway (published in the Christmas Graphic) Faithless Nelly Gray (originally published in the Graphic Christmas Number 1888, printed lithograph in colour, illustration by William Ralston) Perils of the Iliterate (originally published in the Graphic Christmas Number 1888, printed lithograph in colour after Adrien Emmanuel Marie) Mrs Golightly’s Dance- Arthur Hopkins (circa 1889 possibly Christmas Graphic) No Cards, A Lady and Thirty Nine Lovers (published in the Graphic 1889) Messrs, Kamdene, Barnesburie, & D’Alston’s Tour in the North (published in book form, Simpkin Marshall 1890) Amongst the illustrations initially there appears be some original cartoons by the hand of J William Lord. However the story, ‘Happy Days at the Seaside and Country signed JWL’, uses illustrations from Kate Greenaway’s ‘Our Babies Amongst the Buttercups and on the Seashore’. The evidence of this would suggest that the majority of the other illustrations have been copied in one form or another from The Graphic or similar. Despite this they have a consistency of style that carries through the album from beginning to end, displaying the artist’s unique, illustrative style. The album is bound in leather by a stationer in Glasgow, the boards are showing some wear with some damage along the spine area, with historic tape repairs, as a consequence the boards are holding tentatively by the reinforced inner hinges front and back. The pages are tissue guarded and the images appear clean and bright, executed in black and brown ink, with some toning, some edge nibbles and minor marks in places with the intermittent presence ink impression marks/shadows from opposite pages (the presence of these marks may be what prompted the tissue guard insertion at a later date). The illustrations appear to have been extracted from various sketch books and mounted in this large leather bound album with images on both sides of most pages, with label to the front paste down ‘J. Warren Law. While this type of item isn’t overly uncommon in one form or another, this comprehensive collection of pen and ink illustrations is on a different level to what is normally presented. Executed by a remarkable talent, with all the assured confidence and skill of the likes of Randoph Caldecott, John Leech and Phil May but with almost contemporary qualities and techniques, (observed in the hatching and extremely fine detail exhibited throughout), of the great contemporary comic master, Robert Crumb.