Original Art and Book for BABYHOOD: STEP BY STEP
Original art for and first edition of this darling baby book, demonstrating the artistic process to publication.
Near fine.
Price: $1,800.00
Original Art and Book for BABYHOOD: STEP BY STEP
The concept of the commercial baby book is directly tied to the changes in infant mortality rates that came as a result of medical advancements in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Mothers purchased or were gifted baby books to record the milestones of their little ones. By standardizing the types of information that mothers should record, baby books that had once existed as a record of the gifts given to newborns "became primers in infant care and mass consumption" (Blakemore). Baby books featured illustrations of beautiful, rosy-cheeked infants, often rendered by prominent women artists. Janet Laura Scott was one such artist, having worked for Volland and various periodicals.
The subtle pastels of Scott's final studies are similar to, but not the same as, the colors in the published version of BABYHOOD. Some of the fine details differ as well — a slight change in a spray of flowers, a repositioning of a hand, the removing of the ribbon decorations on a duvet. The reasons for this become clear when the studies and the illustrations are compared side-by-side: the art was simplified in order to be visually "read" better in the smaller book format, and the colors were brightened up to make them pop on the page. The watercolors also include penciled in text demonstrating how the images would interact with the larger layout of the page. An attractive case study in both domestic expectations of the period and the important changes that occur as art goes to print.
Read more: Erin Blakemore, "The Long-Lost Ritual of Baby Books," JStor Daily.
The Object
First edition. Racine, Wisconsin: Whitman Publishing Company, 1938. 18'' x 14'' (art); 12'' x 8.5'' (book). Two watercolor illustrations and pencil page layouts on stuff card, each signed by Scott. Book with original cloth-backed boards, illustrated in color, entirely unused. [44] pages. Book with light bumping to corners and spine ends, a touch of toning to edges, one tiny spot of soil. Art with a few tiny areas of faint soil; remnants of early adhesive tape to rears. Bright.
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