GODS, MYTHS AND MORTALS

Description

In 1923, “Edmund Dulac, the Distinguished English Artist,”as he was billed on the front covers, was contracted by the Hearst organization to paint watercolors for The American Weekly. The contract lasted nearly 30 years.From the 1920s onward, Dulac’s income came primarily from his American Weekly illustrations. He painted 106 watercolors for thirteen different series from 1924 through 1951.

The two series featured here are the 1931 Love Stories the Ancients Believed In and the 1933 Myths the Ancients Believed. For ‘Love Stories’, Dulac painted the lovers at the moment of their highest drama, according to the interpretation from Ovid’s tales. They were republished in Good Housekeeping magazine and later as book by Hugh Williamson Ross titled Gods and Mortals in Love published by Country Life Books in 1936. It was so popular that Dulac quickly followed up with ‘Myths’. Both are painted in his high art deco tableau style, with the characters frozen in the act. This is the first republishing since then.

Love Stories the Ancients Believed In- 1931

Perseus and Andromeda

Pan and Syrinx

Psyche and Eros

Circe and Ulysses

Orpheus and Eurydice

Europa and Zeus

Selene and Endymion

 Hercules and Dejanira

 Persephone and Pluto

Venus and Adonis

Medea and Jason

Myths the Ancients Believed- 1933

Iris and The God of Sleep

Echo and Narcissus

Hercules and Hebe

Glaucus and Scylla

Pomona and Vertumnus

Diana and Actaeon

Ariadne and Bacchus

Flora and Zephyr