Le
Grand Exemplaire
as a
Worldwide Unique
Collector’s Item
with
Preparatory Drawing
& Printing Plate
Johann Elias Ridinger (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 sheet. Engraved title with large vignette of a boar-hunt + 21 etchings with engraving (11⅛-11⅜ × 9¾-10 in [28.4-28.8 × 24.8-25.3 cm]) in the mixed technique of etching with engraving typical for Ridinger and his time.
Ruby red morocco
with 4 ornamental raised bands, 2 dark green back-plates, gilt bipartite title on the front + reduced Ridinger stag from the Evening (Th. 240) of The Deer’s Four Times of Day on the back cover, gilt lines on both, and ridinger handlung niemeyer (ridinger gallery niemeyer) on the inner front cover below, all in 23.5 carat,
in homogeneous Solander box
with
– 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 deemed the plates of this set lost – the
original printing plate to the title
in reverse (11¼ × 10 in [28.6 × 25.5 cm]) as removable solitaire laid into the front cover under polycarbonate glass. Above the artist’s name and below the hall mark as unicum
– Le Grand Exemplaire –
and on the inner front cover ridinger handlung niemeyer, all gilt tooled as before.
Enclosed besides, coming up with provenances Alexander Count of Faber-Castell (his sale K&F LXVI/10, 1958) & Christie’s London (5860/360, 2009), the fully executed, in conformity with the etching top-arched
original preparatory drawing in reverse for The Lynx
as sheet X, Th. 148, of the set in brown pen-and-ink with brown wash over traces of graphite. Inscribed: J. El. Ridinger del. 1759. 14 × 10¾ in (357 × 272 mm; subject size incl. signature 9 × 9⅞ in [230 × 250 mm]). – “There he sits with furious gesture, or rather stands erected on a piece of rock and keeps the advancing (3) hounds in mighty respect” (Th.). – On strong laid paper with cut watermark Crown center right. – Margins below/above 5.6-6 cm, laterally 0.8-1.1 cm wide. – The not quite perfect preservation solely due to the effects of having been framed for years, thus the paper in addition to the light edge within the cutout of the mat generally evenly toned and with regard to the brown glue strip verso having been stretched in the then obsolete manner. Aside from this absolutely impeccable.
Thienemann + Schwarz 139-160; Niemeyer, Ridinger Erlebnisse 1698-2020, 2021, pp. 131 f. with 4 (3 color) ills. & 264; 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.
Copy of absolutely uniformly fine print quality ,
most wide-margined sheet-size of 21½-22 × 14⅜-15 in (54.5-56 × 36.5-38 cm) ,
coming from an old extensive collection ,
what means,
three sides uncut
with the original laid paper edges (sic!) .
For comparison :
Schwerdt’s copy reached with only 17½ × 11¾ in (44.5 × 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 an 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 to the right half and here noticeable somewhat disturbingly only out of the subject. – The title, printed differently on especially buff laid paper, cut also at the top and thus with only 53 cm a little shorter.
In company with the original plate of the title and the wide-marginedness crowned by being uncut on three sides as
a truly
grand et unique exemplaire de luxe
for elitist placing. As a provocatingly exclusive sovereign eye-catcher, enviedly reflecting the noblesse of the house. Adequately presented within the Red Series of lüder h. niemeyer as of highest grade.
On account of its beauty as a Gesamtkunstwerk , a synthesis of the arts
looked at again and again fully imbued with inner touch.
Offer no. 29,108 | price on application
to the extensive detail description
