Un Journal en Images

I am much obliged to Yvon Benoit for letting me know about his Journal en Images, a current work-in-progress in the shape of a most intriguing pictorial diary. M. Benoit has kindly given me permission to reproduce a few of its images here: four ‘pages’ from the Journal follow below. As well as this diary, M. Benoit’s site features nine other galleries of his highly distinctive drawings and prints. As I know nothing more about Yvon or his art (beyond the simple fact that I enjoy it), I will continue by simply reproducing the artist’s own brief introduction to his work…

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Depuis toujours apparaissent des formes lorsque je pose le regard. Bien sûr je vois les objets, les paysages comme tels. Mais l’interaction des formes dans l’espace, la lumière et les multiples effets de perspective induisent une infinité de lectures. C’est ce jeu de découvertes qui m’a valu bien des réprimandes puisque ce sont mes cahiers d’école qui en étaient souvent le théâtre. Heureusement, de généreux professeurs m'ont montré la richesse dans la recherche des mondes de l’intérieur. Bien beau. La jeunesse, la fougue, la curiosité et l’esprit plutôt pragmatique ont fait qu'après une tentative en atelier il m'a fallu sortir et courir le monde. Voir, entendre, sentir, ingérer et étonnamment ne pas comprendre.

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Essoufflé et habité par un profond sentiment d'humilité, le grand terrain de l'espace pictural est devenu le lieu de la macération, de la fermentation, de la digestion. Là où la parole laisse la place à l'image. Là où la curiosité pousse à fouiller, avec des outils de plus en plus fins à l'exemple des archéologues, afin de peut-être découvrir du sens jusque dans les infinis petits détails. C’est cette réflexion visuelle qui vous est proposée ici.

Paulini’s ABC, etc.

While browsing around in abebooks last week, I learned of a ‘rare and beautiful printed Mannerist alphabet, designed and engraved by a certain Italian I. Paulini,’ I hoped I might find this alphabet on-line, but the most I was able to turn up in any one place were its first three letters, by way of some pages devoted to La Letter et le Signe at the Bibliothèque National de France. These are reproduced below. I also found the letter ‘R’ from this alphabet via one of Luc Devroye’s brief mentions of Paulini, but have since misplaced it, and haven’t yet found my way back to it.

Paulini’s alphabet is undated, and it is not known where it was printed, or by whom. Nor is anything known about Paulini himself. It comprises the twenty letters A-I, L-T, V and Z. ‘ Each letter is a fantastic composite of human figures, botanical and marine specimens, landscapes or cityscapes, with a frame of arabesques, grotesques, putti, antique statuary, and the like. No two frames are identical. Each letter encapsulates a mythological episode from the Methamorphoses of Ovid. For example: the A for Actaeon, B for Bacchus, C for Cadmus, etc. The Ovidian episode is illustrated behind each letter, and printed captions identify the figures: for example “Ateone mutato in Cervo da Diana:” Actaeon being metamorphosed into a deer by the nude bathing Diana, etc.’

There is also a reference to Paulini in an article by Fritz Franz Vogel (co-author of a number of alphabet-related works, a couple of which I have mentioned here before). In the article, Vogel lists numerous figurative alphabets, including some others I have previously noted (including those by de’ Grassi, de Bry, Braccelli and Mitelli) but also several more I have not yet seen; so I will be on the lookout for alphabets by Giacomo Franco, Richard Daniel, Lucas Kilian, ‘Herculanus,’ John Seddon, and others.

I have been distracted these past weeks by an irksome work project, hence the even less frequent posting here than ever. Alas, this vexation is likely to continue for at least a few more weeks to come…

Merian

The engraver Matthæus Merian was born in Basel in 1590: his forebears had worked as sawyers and timber-merchants in that city. Merian was first trained as a glass-engraver, but went on (in 1609-10) to study etching and copperplate-engraving in Zürich. From there he travelled to Strasbourg, and then to Nancy, where he worked on some of the elaborate plates printed in commemoration of the death of Charles III., duke of Lorraine. Merian spent the next few years (from 1612) in Paris, working for the engravers and print-sellers Claude de la Ruelle and Nicolas de Mathonière, among others. In 1615, he returned to his native city, and in that year published a major plan of Basel, a series of copies of the work of Jaques Bellange, and hunting scenes after designs by Antonio Tempesta.

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In 1616, Merian spent time in Stuttgart, where he illustrated a royal baptism of the house of Württemberg. From there, he travelled again, via Nuremberg and Augsburg, to Oppenheim, where he began a professional and personal involvement with the renowned engraver and publisher Johann Theodor de Bry, that was to shape the remainder of his working life. 1617 saw the publication by the house of de Bry of (among other works) Robert Fludd’s encyclopædic opus Utriusque cosmi historia and of Michael Maier’s extraordinary emblem-book Atalanta Fugiens: Merian contributed the engraved illustrations to both of these works. In the same year, Merian married Maria Magdalena de Bry, Johann Theodor’s daughter.

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Merian continued working with his father-in-law until 1620, the family having meanwhile relocated their business to Frankfurt in 1619. The engraver spent the next few years back in Basel: the present images are details from two series of engravings he executed during these years. The first quartet of images (above) are from a set of Die vier jahreszeiten, ‘the four seasons,’ issued in 1622; while the second set of four images (below) illustrate Die vier tageszeiten, ‘the four times of day:’ this latter series having been published in 1624, after Merian moved, with his wife and infant son, back to Frankfurt, where he took over the family business in the wake of Johann Theodor’s death.

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Merian cemented his position as head of the de Bry firm in 1626, when he became a citizen of Frankfurt. He established the firm ‘as one of Europe’s leading producers of topographical and historical work.’ His elder son Matthæus became a successful portrait painter, while his his younger son Caspar concentrated on engraving. Maria Magdalena died in 1645, and Merian afterwards remarried. His two daughters from his first marriage both went on to marry engravers, while his daughter from his second marriage, Maria Sibylla Merian, ‘became an outstanding painter of plants and insects, working in Holland and Surinam.’ Merian died in 1650, after which the younger Matthæus took over the business, which ‘remained under the family’s control until 1727.’

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The present images are details of scans taken from the pages of vol. 1 of the catalogue raisonnée by Lucas Heinrich Wüthrich: Das druckgraphische Werk von Matthæus Merian d. Ae; published in Basel in 1966 (a second volume followed in 1972). Click on the details to see the engravings reproduced larger, and in full. For more of Merian’s work, see this wikimedia page.