[Rarebooks] OFFER: UNHEARD OF AMERICAN NEOCLASSIC ETCHINGS.

[Laderman]

LATILLA, EUGENIO H.(ONORIUS): CARTOONS IN OUTLINE ILLUSTRATIVE OF THE 
GOSPELS. New york, pub. By the artist, 1852. Folio, etched title page with 
vignette and  24  FP plates. 43 cm.. Latilla began exhibiting in London in 
1828 as a figure and portrait painter and was elected a member of  the 
Society of British Artists in 1838. He went to Rome in 1842 and spent 
1848-49 in Florence, where he published the first version of his book of 
Gospel cartoons. They are extremely skillful neoclassicizing cartoons and 
are related to both Flaxman and the Nazarene Brotherhood, especially to the 
work of Overbeck. He left for America in 1851 and lived and worked in New 
York until 1859. He was an Honorary Member of the National Academy, 
Professional, from 1847. He died at home in Chappaqua in 1861. He exhibited 
regularly at the National Academy. His earlier portraits are to be found in 
the British National Portrait Gallery. No other work of this quality in the 
neoclassical tradition was published in the United States in the 19th 
century. This, although first published in Florence, was reprinted by the 
artist himself who had emigrated to the United States. It included 49 
plates in the Florence edition, half of them illuminated texts. The plates 
were gilded and hand colored in that issue. Here, without the gilding and 
coloring they can be seen in all their neoclassic simplicity. Latilla 
etched the plates himself, and has etched a new pictorial title page for 
this issue. They are thus original artists etchings, and he is an 
important, and unnoted, early American predecessor of the artist-etcher 
movement. This copy is inscribed in pencil on the title page from the 
artist to Grace Field and dated December 25th 1852, as a Christmas present. 
Both editions of his cartoons are very rare. OCLC shows three locations of 
the Florence 1848 issue [NYP, SMI, BMC] and one, only, [NDD] of this one. 
To this list COPAC adds 1 of the Florence issue at Cambridge. Groce & 
Wallace P. 385, Cummings Historic Annals P. 304, Benezit 5, 425. See also 
Graves, Redgrave, Thieme and Becker and Tuckerman. Original blue Dec. 
boards, gilt title. The backstrip is an old, simple and usable, cloth, 
amateur reback. There is a little foxing on some of the plates, but the 
book is internally near Fine, OW about Very Good. $1000.00


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