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ALI BABA AND THE FORTY THIEVES

BOOK PLATE PRINT ARABIAN NIGHTS

EDMUND DULAC ART NOUVEAU 1923

This Arabian Nights character is Morgiana from Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves. The book’s antique 1923 paper page is tanned and has a small crease on the top of the page. There are some faint creases in the print’s right bottom quadrant. However, subject matter, overall good condition and larger size makes this Dulac print quite desirable. The art print was made to be removable for framing and that will hide any tiny edge flaws. It measures 4.75 x 6 7/8. inches. The book page is 6 x 8.75 inches. See photos.

Title: Stories from the Arabian Nights

Publisher: George H. Doran Co., New York

Publication Date: 1923

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Dulac (1882–1953) was a French-born, British naturalised magazine illustrator, book illustrator and stamp designer.

An illustrated version of the Arabian classic, Dulac's watercolors capture the spirit of the Tales of the Arabian Nights.

With these types of illustrations, children’s books became items of beauty that adults collected as emblems of affluence and good taste.

A new technology of color separation made it cheaper to print color book plates, resulting in a genre of gift books where tipped on color plates were placed between pages as “gifts” rather than being bound into the spine. Dulac was dominant in this genre—as a colorist fascinated with pigments, patterns and Eastern traditions. Bright jewel patterns that radiated and sparkled fired his imagination. He was drawn toward mysticism, the occult and exotic.

Since art school, he’d been fascinated by the East and Arabic languages, intrigued by written Arabic characters. Nocturnal scenes in The Ara­bian Nights let him use rich blues—ultramarine, Prussian blue, indigo, violets and purples—creating magical, translucent textures, starry nights sparkling with saturated watercolor pigments.

The watercolor book plates were reproduced in yellow, red and blue inks, which were overlaid onto a black key plate. Dulac’s suffused watercolor technique was well-suited for this. In reproduction, the initial ink drawing was covered by three successive layers of printing inks, muting the ink line into one that was no longer truly black. This process enhanced Dulac’s soft illustra­tions and contributed to his renown as a colorist. His palette moved from blues to a bold, orientally influenced range of colors. His watercolors had dreamlike atmospheres, adding mystery and magic.

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