 |
| Click image to enlarge Frontispiece from "Mr. Punch's Pocketbook" Charles Keene, 1872 The British Museum |
Next Friday, you’ll be seeing another of my Christmas gifts—“Mr. Punch’s Pocketbook” from 1860. So, I thought this week, I’d show you a later example of this pocket-sized almanac to give you a sense of the object. “Mr. Punch’s Pocketbook” was the iPad mini of the Nineteenth Century. It contained everything a gentleman traveling by train could ever need from the names of the Royal Family to the cost of postage. It even was filled with beautiful illustrations, stories, jokes and articles which would keep a gent entertained.
So, today, let’s look at this one from 1872. This example lives at the British Museum. All of Mr. Punch’s Pocketbooks included a frontispiece which unfolded into a trifold scene. In this case, we have an illustration by Charles Keene (1823-1872) which depicts “A Matrimonial Hurlingham” This was a pigeon-shooting match wherein eligible bachelors are the pigeons, and the young ladies shoot. Fair enough. Cupid is assisting the ladies, waiting nearby on the right with a string in his hand to deploy a trap.
Even in 1872, each of this lovely frontispieces was hand-colored with watercolor and touched with white gouache.
I look forward to sharing my own 1860 Pocketbook to you next week. I just have to figure out how best to reproduce it without harming it.
No comments:
Post a Comment