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COMPARATIVE IMPLEMENTOLOGY

French Decorative Bookbinding - Eighteenth Century

Pierre-Paul Dubuisson's work attributed to Derome le jeune.

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(click on this image to see an enlargement.)


This magnificently decorated binding was executed by Pierre-Paul Dubuisson, as I will presently demonstrate. Before we start this examination however I want to point out the terrible injustice of this binding being attributed by modern "experts" to Derome le jeune. A Dubuisson masterpiece dumped in with the mediocre work of Derome, is an injustice that must be corrected. The reproduction of this binding is found in the 2010 ALDE auction catalogue entitled Bibliotheque Vincent Labouret (jeudi 27 mai) below I include a copy of the description of this item # 70.

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There are a number of errors in this description, the one that annoys me the most however is the "By Derome, a beautiful specimen of bibliopegistic skill" indeed! They attempt to impress with exacting terminology and yet have failed in their identification of the artist! On the previous page we looked at imprints that can be shown to be identical to the ones found on this particular binding These imprints derive from the tools of Dubuisson. and were not made with Derome's copies of Dubuisson's tools.

Fortunately the reproduction of item 70 also reveals the decoration of the spine, thus we have an opportunity to compare it with certain other Dubuisson examples.



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Comparative Diagram 1 - Dubuisson gold tooling - spines (click to enlarge)


In Comparative Diagram 1, we see part of the lower spine of Item 70 (A) next to a Dubuisson spine (B) that I have fully detailed on another page (click to see this page) see also this page for further proof that these are imprints from Dubuisson's tools.



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Comparative Diagram 2 - Dubuisson gold tooling - spines (click to enlarge)


In Comparative Diagram 2, we see part of the lower spine of Item 70 (A) next to a Dubuisson spine (B) that I have detailed on another page (click to see this page)


palettes



Comparative Diagram 3 - Dubuisson gold tooling - spines (click to enlarge)


In Comparative Diagram 3, you will notice that the first spine example (A) displays a number of identical imprints to those in Item 70, (shown at a larger scale in Comparative diagram 2). In Comparative Diagram 4 below I show both at the same scale and common imprint pd-46a-2 and pd-46b-2. This is the same imprint however there is a reversed orientation.


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Comparative Diagram 4 - Dubuisson gold tooling - spines (click to enlarge)


Dubuisson's bird in the spine compartments of example B in Comparative Diagram 4, reaffirms that these imprints derive from the tools of Pierre-Paul Dubuisson.










click on this link to return to: The Dubuisson links page.



information about the author return to the home page of VIRTUAL BOOKBINDING

l.a.miller@mail.pf