Description
Artistic and Monumental Spain: The Travels in Spain of the Painter Genaro Pérez de Villa-Amil (also written as Jenaro Pérez de Villaamil). This work is a title of capital importance for any lover of Art, Architecture and the History of Spain.
Facsimile edition published in 2011 of the most luxurious and substantive work of Spanish Romanticism in a limited and numbered print run of 997 notarized copies, based on the original preserved in the Biblioteca de la Sociedad Bilbaina under the call number 7(R).
French lithographers reproduced the prodigious detail of the 144 engravings by Pérez de Villaamil, giving rise to a work of capital importance not only for bibliophiles but for any lover of Art, Architecture or History.
The value of the work lies in addition to the extraordinary beauty of the engravings of the most representative monuments that we know today, in which the painter reflects historic buildings that no longer exist as a result of the unfortunate confiscation of Mendizábal in 1836 or the great urban reforms that took place in the 19th century.
Deluxe edition in 3 impressive volumes presented in a solid wood case made especially for this work with a total weight of 25 kilos.
Characteristics of the work:
Limited and numbered facsimile edition before a notary public.
The landscapes of Spain in the 19th century
Origin: Paris 1842-1850
Large format 40 x 56.5 cm. Weight of each book almost 6 kg.
144 lithographs by the painter Jenaro Pérez de Villaamil
Binding: Dutch in leather ribbed spine and gold stampings and blue cloth on planes.
Large format solid wood cover 35.5 x 61.5 x 15.5 cm, with an empty weight of 7 kg.
Complementary study book by Enrique Arias Anglés, bound in illustrated hardcover format 24.5 x 33.3 cm. 132 pages with color illustrations. Texts in Spanish.
The romantic painter Jenaro Pérez de Villa-Amil was a genius of different pictorial disciplines. So much so that at the age of 8 he became a drawing teacher at the San Fernando Royal Academy of Fine Arts. His life is worthy of an adventure novel: military surveyor, war hero, political exile in Paris, painter in Puerto Rico, Belgium and England and, finally, court painter to Queen Elizabeth II.
An admirer of the work of the Scottish painter David Roberts, he takes advantage of his experience as a military topographer to lead the Spanish romantic movement in its landscape and monumental facet, the work “Spain Artistic and Monumental” being its greatest exponent.
In this unique work, lithographs of representative monuments of Spain are collected. To create the stone plates, made by the best lithographers in France, the drawings and engravings that Pérez de Villaamil collected on his travels through Spain between 1830 and 1838, as well as those of other authors, were used.
In addition, the scarcity of complete originals of the bound work has turned “Spain Artistic and Monumental” into a cult object for Spanish and European bibliophiles. The clever booksellers of the time preferred in many cases, instead of selling a bound book, to sell the loose lithographs to get more money. Hence, today it is almost impossible to find a complete copy.
At the time, between 1842 and 1850, the work was sold by installments from Paris. Some of the clients were the kings and intellectuals of the European courts, such as the Queen of Spain herself or King Otto of Greece.
Exemplary in perfect condition, the wooden case may present some small blows due to its weight, without major importance, in the manipulation of the work. Out of print and hard to find edition with the cover/case/wooden cabinet.
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