Description

Immediate dispatch from Somerset. Nice older book in great condition. Pages in excellent condition. Images are beautiful bright and vivid. Some creasing on cover. No notes or highlighting. See images. Fantastic book.

About the book >.>.> In France Jacques Androuet du Cerceau the Elder produced two compilations of bird’s eye views of royal and private estates published in 1576 and 1579 as Le Premier Volume des plus excellents Bastiments de France. The initiative is not entirely clear even now. Unlike Leonard Knyff more than a century later the engravings were not commis- sioned or dedicated pieces. They are linear con- veying no sense of place or landscape. Whatever may have been Du Cerceau’s motivation he pro- duced a book of views proclaiming the splendours of French ch?teaux many then built to his designs. Although the Bastiments de France set an important precedent in France the publication was isolated and did not create a fashion for painting houses and gardens. Indeed it is surpris- ing how few oil painted estate views there are in France in the period 1580 to 1640. There was no demand and a painter was better employed on portraits history pieces or mythology. And so we must move from France as the epicentre to the Netherlands where the initiative was found for. (LL)