Gustave Doré

Prolific French artist Gustave Doré was widely celebrated for his illustrations and woodcut prints. He created more than ten thousand images for books and magazines that were disseminated in a number of languages, including the works of Byron, Goethe, Coleridge, Cervantes and Milton, as well as illustrations for the Bible. Thanks to contemporary technological improvements in the mass-reproduction of engravings, during his lifetime he became the most widely known working illustrator in Europe.

Dante’s Divine Comedy was the first major series of works that Doré chose to undertake without being commissioned. Despite the burgeoning craze for Dante’s material in 19^th century France – there had been numerous translations into French by the 1860s, with particular interest in the tales of Francesca da Rinimi and Ugolino from the Inferno – Doré was forced to finance the publication of The vision of hell himself. The move proved fruitful – the folio was instantly successful and critically acclaimed, so much so that publishing house Hachette swiftly acquired the subsequent illustrations of the Purgatorio and Paradiso for publication.

Doré’s style is very much of a piece with the Romantic movement – it conjures sublime vistas, Gothic chiaroscuro, high drama, emotional affect and gorgeously rendered bodies. His craftsmanship, the delicacy of his line-work and shading, and eye for composition are self-evident.

So admired were Dore’s illustrations of the Divine Comedy, with their vivid rendering of Dante’s imagery, that they quickly became regarded as synonymous with the text, and have remained relevant alongside the original work. Thus, Doré’s imagery has helped shape the modern concept of the Christian afterlife in the popular consciousness.