Posts

Showing posts with the label Jewish

Jacob Balgley: a forgotten contemporary of Chagall

Image
Jacob Balgley, Rue � J�rusalem Etching How many of us have ever heard of Jacob Balgley, a direct contemporary of Marc Chagall? Not me, until I acquired a copy of Portrait de Jacob Balgley, written by his friend Claude Roger-Marx, and containing nine original etchings and four original drypoints. It was published in 1959, 25 years after the artist's death. The etchings and drypoints were printed on Vidalon wove paper by J.-J.-J. Rigal on the handpress of Mme Daragn�s, and the book forms part of a series of hommages to various artists published by Manuel Bruker, variously with the title Portrait de, �loge de, Visite �, or Tombeau de So-and-so. Each was published in an edition of 200 copies, the first 20 usually with an additional suite of the prints in the book. In the case of Portrait de Jacob Balgley, all of the books also had 9 additional prints loosely inserted at the back, four wonderful etchings and five rather pedestrian drypoints. Balgley seems to be a very interesting instan