The  AHA!  Event  of  the  Month

Ridinger, Johann Elias (Ulm 1698 – Augsburg 1767). The Fair Game Hounded by the Different Kinds of Hounds. With annotations how such are hunted, attacked, catched, held fast, brought down, and partly throttled by them … presented and edited by Johann Elias Ridinger painter and engraver, director of the Augsburg Academy, too, in the year 1761. Set of 22 sheets.

(28.4-28.8 x 24.8-25.3 cm) in the mixed technique of etching + engraving typical for Ridinger and his time.

Ruby  red  morocco

with 4 imitated ribs, 2 dark green back-plates, gilt two-piece title on the front + Ridinger-stag-vignette on the backcover, gilt lines on both, and ridinger handlung niemeyer (ridinger gallery niemeyer) on the inner frontcover below, all in 23.5 carat,

– traced back here far beyond Thieme-Becker (vol. XXVIII, 1933, p. 308) seamlessly directly to the master’s estate itself and therewith correcting Thienemann (1856) who declared the plates of this set as being deprived – the

original  printing-plate  to  the  title

in reverse (28.6 x 25.5 cm) as removable solitaire laid into the frontcover under polycarbonate glass (more resistant to aging + UV light than Plexiglas, but equally sensitive to scratches). Above the artist’s name and below the hall mark as uniqueness

– Le  Grand  Exemplaire –

and on the inner frontcover ridinger handlung niemeyer, all gilt-tooled as before.

Th. + Schwarz 139-160; Weigel, Kunstlager-Cat., XXVIII, 13 A (?, perhaps intermediate state, of A-C); Nagler 16; Coppenrath pt. II, 1464; Schwerdt III (1928), 137 (“An interesting series”). – Illustrations: Schwarz I, plt. VIII; Stubbe, Ridinger, 1966, plts. 14-16; Ridinger Cat. Kielce, 1997, pp. 38-41.

what means,

while before binding the left-sided clean cut with practically nevertheless the full 6 cm margin like on the right let think that two sheets each may have been printed on one sheet of paper being in accordance with the size of Ridinger’s largest prints, Th. 67/68, printed from one plate. In the absence of every traces of tacks and marbling the set was obviously never bound. Only the title, printed differently on especially buff laid paper, cut also on top and so with only 53 cm a little shorter.

For comparison :

Schwerdt’s copy reached with only 44.5 x 29.8 cm already the top of its boar-spike !

Isolated typographic watermarks. – Outer margins of the title slightly smudgy and right-sided somewhat teared. Three sheets with original small defects in a outermost marginal corner. Slight trace of squeezing in the white outer margin of XI, a smoothed diagonal fold in left and lower margin touching still the outermost white corner of the plate and a further one, confined to the outer white upper margin, in XII. The general squeezing of the paper of VII predominantly confined on the right half and here noticeable somewhat disturbingly only out of the subject.

Contents :

The European Bison – The Bear (“there is a good engraving of a bear fighting with hounds, pl. 14”, Stubbe) – The Elk – The Red Stag – The Wild Sow or Boar – The Wolf – The White Fir-Stag (Fallow-Deer) – The Wild Swan (“surely the rarer Whooper Swan”) – The Lynx – The Reindeer – The Roe – The Chamois – The Fox – The Beaver – The Otter – The Wildcat – The Hare – The Badger – The Marten – The Polecat, Squirrel and Weasel – Wild Ducks .

Thienemann :

“ Thus a theme with 21 variations … What a variety, what a truth in the expression of emotions! Yes, indeed, he is in fact an animal mind-painter.  Hence  his works speak to us so exceedingly,  hence  we cannot take our eyes off them,  hence  he sticks … always new, valuable and esteemed … One of the later works of Ridinger, but completely done himself alone … ”

On top the figuration closed in an arch. – With 9-13-line subtext as well to the game itself as to selection + action of the different races of its assailants. In this instructiveness quite in the sense of Stubbe, who quotes in respect of the Par force Hunting as a further late work (p. 30):

“ … and their subtexts … bring together the pleasant satisfaction

which  good  informations, developed  thoroughly, can  give .

A  life  full  of  hunting  experience ,

a knowledge, earned in many years by conceivable alert attention, of the causes and considerations which lead to the single steps and hunting practices qualify the artist to define all kinds of hunting

not  only  after  their  execution ,

but  especially  out  of  their  reasons .

This happens … in all shortness … the limited space under the subjects come up to intensive, but easily understandable annotations in engraved writing. ”

And so it is the quite extraordinary satisfaction and joy here together to be able not alone to not just present anew this

after the copies of the Luza collection, Amsterdam, (1982) and within the second of the two Pompadour volumes of the Marjoribanks Folios sold here in 1998 resp., but in company with the  original  plate of the title and the widemarginedness crowned by being uncut on three sides as

for elitist placing. As a provocatingly exclusive sovereign eye-catcher, enviedly reflecting the noblesse of the house.

That  the  master  has  worked  the  printing-plate  himself  alone

shall be mentioned expressly. – Sheltered from environmental influences by varnish the plate is printable generally in the ordinary course of its use during the times, but no guarantee for its final printing quality. Quite irrespectively of this, however, you should have a look

again and again.

Offer no. 28,822  /  price on request

“ … I was digging and I found you. I needed to tell you that your collection for whatever reason has brought tears to my eyes. Thank you … I’m not a collector, or I haven’t known myself to be … I was going to sell this (sheet), but I just may have discovered that I’m to keep this for whatever reason. Have you made a collector out of me … For all your devotion, hardwork … I thank you ”

(Mrs. D. H., June 17, 2002)