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CHIVERS, CEDRIC; TENNYSON, ALFRED LORD; CARLETON SMYTH, DOROTHY Works of Alfred Lord Tennyson, TheIn a Superb 'Vellucent' Binding by Cedric Chivers Hand-Painted By Dorothy Carleton Smyth [CHIVERS, Cedric, binder]. [SMYTH, Dorothy Carleton]. [TENNYSON, Alfred Lord]. The Works of Alfred Lord Tennyson Poet Laureate. London: Macmillan and Co., 1899. Octavo (7 1/8 x 4 1/2 in; 180 x 115 mm). viii, 900, [2], [2, advertisements]. Inserted engraved frontispiece of Tennyson by G. J. Stodart. In a fine 'vellucent' binding by Cedric Chivers of Bath, who invented the process. Full transparent vellum over paper boards with two fine pen-and-ink and watercolor designed panels by Dorothy Carleton Smyth in red, orange, green, black, yellow and gilt. The front cover ruled in gilt with gilt title "King Arthur [small black and pale brown dragon within a circle] Pendragon" depicts King Arthur in armor kneeling, holding his sword with gilt dotted red, pink and yellow flowers in the background. The back cover ruled in gilt with gilt title "Guinevere [small black and pale brown dragon within a circle] His Queen" depicts Guinevere kneeling, praying and leaning on a Book of Hours. In the background, a trellis of roses in pink and yellow with gilt dots. Spine panel ruled and lettered in gilt with pink and green flowers with gilt dots. Each panel against a pale green marbled background. Gilt-decorated board edges, turn-ins ruled in gilt. All edges brightly gilt. Green marbled endpapers. A superb example. Housed in a blue cloth drop-back box. 'In his large bindery at Portway, Bath, [Cedric] Chivers employed about forty women for folding, sewing, mending, and collating work, and in addition, five more women worked in a separate department, to design, illuminate, and colour vellum for book decoration, and to work on embossed leather. These five were Dorothy Carl[e]ton Smyth, Alice Shepherd, Miss J.D. Dunn, Muriel Taylor, and Agatha Gales. Most Vellucent bindings were designed by H. Granville Fell, but the woman most frequently employed for this kind of work was probably Dorothy Carl[e]ton Smyth' (Marianne Tidcombe, Women Bookbinders 1880-1920, p. 86). Of Smyth's watercolor designs for this particular binding, Chivers wrote, "Strikingly original in treatment" (Chivers Catalogue). 'Smyth [1880-1933] was born in Glasgow, the daughter of a jute manufacturer. She studied art in Manchester and then attended the Glasgow School of Art from 1895 until 1905. Her stained glass piece Tristan and Iseult was exhibited at the International Exhibition in 1901, and in 1903 an anonymous female patron paid for Smyth to study in Europe. At first Smyth was best known as a portraitist, particularly for her sketches of theatre personalities. Later she specialised in theatre costume working in London, Paris and Sweden. She designed costumes for several of the Shakespearean Festivals held in Stratford-upon-Avon, beginning in 1906. Smyth was appointed Principal of Commercial Art at Glasgow School of Art in 1914, and began to concentrate more on teaching than costume design. However, in 1916 she designed costume and decoration for the Quinlan Opera Company's world tour. In 1933 Smyth was appointed as the first woman director of the School of Art, but died before she could take up the post' (The Glasgow Story at http://www.theglasgowstory.com/image.php?inum=TGSE01208). "Some years ago a remarkable method of decoration for the binding of books originated in the fertile mind of Mr. Cedric Chivers of Bath, England, and after making several experiments, which gave promise of future successful employment of artists with fresh ideas of treatment, designs were prepared for binding to be produced under the required conditions. Specially selected skins of clear unstretched vellum were the simple and legitimate means employed, and after a few further trials and experiments, the result proved the new method to be wider in scope and more varied in its range of artistic possibilities than any previously attempted. "Since the art of gilding leather was introduced into Europe from the east, about the year 1740, by the Venetians, nothing new in the external decoration of books has been achieved which gives such endless opportunities for beautiful and permanent decoration as does the transparent vellum, or 'Vellucent,' method... "The 'Vellucent' method... allows of the utmost freedom of conception compatible with the tenets of good surface decoration; and, since by reason of its nature, greater liberty of pictorial treatment is legitimised, the field both for design and color becomes almost limitless. "It has sometimes been charged that external book decoration could not legitimately be classed in the graphic arts, but if graphic delineation on flat surfaces be a correct technical definition, then this "Vellucent" method warrants its inclusion. "The permanency, strength, toughness, and durability of vellum as a binding material has for ages past been fully recognized, and the fact that the surface is capable of being cleaned without injury, being impervious to the action of damp, was an important point in Mr. Chivers' deliberations while dealing with the external decoration of books by the particular method he had in view. This method is perfectly simple and logical in its process. "The designs were first painted or drawn in colors with as full a palette or as subdued a richness of coloring as the artist chose to employ. Various iridescent materials and precious metals, pared to the thinness of paper or even of gold leaf, according to the fancy of the designer, were often introduced to enhance the richness of the scheme; mother-o'-pearl, shell, beetles' wings, these and other beautiful materials were utilized in the carrying out of the designs with the greatest felicity of effect. The transparent vellum was then laid upon the surface of the painting and the two pressed together till they became indisseverable. Gold tooling was now superimposed upon the surface of the subcutaneous coloring, often with results surprising in their richness and beauty. Indeed, the vellum itself, though of perfect transparency, has, from its delicate warmth of hue, the quality of rendering luminous and reconciling colors otherwise difficult to combine harmoniously in juxtaposition, its appearance being that of a beautiful enamel-like glaze. The whole field of color, of iridescence, is thus open to the artist who elects to decorate books bound in "Vellucent." "It may be claimed that the color effects produced, seeing the nature of the materials employed, exceed in brilliancy and beauty anything in the whole range of artistic expression yet achieved. A book when complete will stand constant use and everyday wear and tear; it has neither excrescences nor protuberances; is absolutely flat, smooth, and pleasant to handle. The design, however beautiful and precious, is permanently secured from dirt and damp in one of the strongest and best materials ever used for the binding of a book. The iridescent and other materials used have been the subject of the most interesting experiments. In spite of the novelty and seeming incongruity of the idea, step by step, each new introduction was carefully thought out,, and a trial made of its adaptability under translucent vellum, Mr., Chivers adopting a wise policy of restraint in allowing only those effects entirely satisfactory to the trained eye of the artist to be accepted for use... "The experiments undertaken and carried out with success in the new forms of decorative binding will appeal to everyone interested in the development of modern art; and it is not too much to affirm that the invention of the 'Vellucent' process inaugurates a new epoch in the history of bookbinding. The full glories of color hitherto denied as embellishment: to the book-cover"the folding-doors of the literary treasure-house"are now made not only possible, but eminently and especially legitimate and appropriate" (The Graphic Arts and Crafts Year Book 1908, The "Vellucent" Process: A New Method Of Decoration For Bound Books, After Cedric Chivers. Reprinted at http://bookbinding.com/graphicarts/chivers.htm). Chivers Catalogue XCIX.
Offered for US$ 9500.00 by: David Brass Rare Books (ABAA/ILAB) - Book number: 01522