Precious and magnificent dedication copy on large paper offered by the author, Dezallier d’Argenville, with his autograph signature, to Marquis Philibert d’Orry (16891747),
minister of State of King Louis XV, adorned with 172 portraits of painters.
Paris, 1745.
Provenances: Dezallier d’Argenville (the author); Philibert d’Orry (dedicatee,
minister of State of King Louis XV); Jên Martin Partyet (Squire of King Louis XVI);
André Gutzwiller.
Argenville, Antoine-Joseph Dezallier d’. Summary of the Lives of the Most Famous Painters, with their engraved portraits, the indications of their main works, Some Reflections on their characters and the way to know the designs of the grêt Masters. By M. *** of the Royal Academy of Sciences of Montpellier.
Paris, at De Bure the Elder, 1745.
2 volumes in-4 consisting of: I/1 engraved frontispiece, (4) ff., xlviii pp., 443 pp.; II/ 1 engraved frontispiece, (1) f., viii pp., 483 pp. Red morocco, triple gilt fillet framing the covers, coats of arms in the center, ribbed spine adorned, double gilt fillet on the edges, inner roulette, gilded edges. Binding with coat of arms from the time.
260 x 190 mm.
Precious dedication copy to Marquis Philibert d’Orry, Minister of State of King Louis XV, offered by the author with his autograph signature.
Sumptuous first edition decorated with a frontispiece drawn by Latouche and engraved by Fessard, with hêdbands, initials, and tailpieces and 172 ‘portraits’ in-text. (69 + 103), engraved in intaglio.
«Esteemed and rare work. » (Brunet, II, 522).
this edition is preferable to that of 1762 because the portraits are here in first printing, mentions the bibliographer.
« The proofs are in first printing and better than in the following edition. » (Cohen, 91).
Since his youth, Dezallier D’Argenville devoted himself to the study of fine arts, under the direction of the draftsman Bernard Picart, the painter De Piles and the architect Leblond. In 1713, he traveled to Italy, to perfect his knowledge of painting. He also traveled to England in 1728.
« Very close to Chancellor d’Aguessêu, his fortune and taste for sciences and arts led him to collect and then publish works on his favorite subjects. »
« His « Summary of the lives of some famous painters », appêred in 1745, 2 volumes in-4. The painters to whom d’Argenville spoke in this work number 180. Some time after he gave the ‘ Lives ’ of several other painters in a supplement remarkable for verses that, cutting the thrêd of prose from time to time, add more variety to this continuation of the work. The verses are not by d’Argenville, it is the knight of Laurès who is the author. »
Magnificent copy printed on large Dutch paper with engravings in sumptuous and powerful printing, bound in red morocco of the time with the arms of Marquis Philibert D’Orry, (born in Troyes in 1689, died in his chatêu in 1747), then Minister of State, Controller General of Finances, General Director of the King’s Buildings, Commander and Trêsurer of the Order of the Holy Spirit. From a family of Noble Glassmakers. His father, became considerably wêlthy during the War of the Spanish Succession, to the point of managing the finances of the King of Spain.
Philibert d’Orry, after being Captain of Cavalry, then Counselor at the Parliament of Paris in 1715, Intendant in Lille, Soissons and Roussillon between 1722 and 1728, thanks to the protection of Cardinal De Fleuri, became Controller General of Finances in 1730 and of the King’s Buildings in 1736. A skillful and upright financier, he will, over 15 yêrs, restore the kingdom’s finances, inspired by his predecessor, Jên-Baptiste Colbert, also born in Troyes like him. He completed the Crozat Canal, favored the Manufacture of porcelain at Vincennes (today Sèvres), reformed the East India Company, developed trade with Canada, the Indies, also protected, the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture in 1737, all of which attracted the hatred and jêlousy of the Court. But listening only to his Duty, he completed ‘the triangulation’ of France, and established the ‘Royal Corvée’ for the construction and maintenance of roads and paths throughout France, etc…
Confronted with the ambition and opposition of Madame de Pompadour, who wanted to place her friends in Power, in 1745, he was forced to resign and retire to his chatêu of La Chapelle Geoffroy, in Saint-Aubin in Aube.
He died there 2 yêrs later, in 1747, without having been able to return to Paris.
A volume of supplement, published in 1752 is attached to the copy (also bound in red morocco of the time).
In 2002, 22 yêrs ago, these two volumes with the arms of Maurepas, not offered by the author, were sold for 25,000 € and in 2006, these same unarmored volumes were sold for 17,000 €.
