Hi and welcome to the first post of my new blog. I’m going to be talking about all kinds of stuff that I am interested in and sharing some amazing art and illustration with you. Today I’d like to share a couple of illustrations from the Faerie Queene. These are from the 1894-97 edition of Edmund Spenser’s Elizabethan poem and the illustrations, brilliantly drawn are by Walter Crane – his best work in my opinion.

 

For me these are the absolute high point of Golden Age illustration. To be honest I never actually attempted to read the poem (a poem that is six books long written in Elizabethan English) – I’m sure its very good! Literature buffs reckon its the original piece of fanatsy fiction (knights witches , ogres giants etc).

 

There are couple of illustrations accross the six volumes and the 85 full page plates that have a small amount of colour tinting but I actually prefer those with no colour and I also love the effect of the aged, yellowing on the pages. I always think this adds a certain quality and mystery to vintage book illustrations – they look kind of sterile if you view them in pure black and white.

 

Considering when these were done, (late 1800′s) some of them are very sensual and daring, with a fair amount of semi naked maidens on show – even up to the 1920′s, a lot of book publishers chose to edit out any nudity.

Here’s some more examples:

 

Absolutely spectacular – I always thought they’d look incredible printed and framed but I’ve yet to try it.

If you want to see much more of the Faerie Queene click here.

Thats it for today. Back tomorrow with some more treats!