When I was a child, books were something special because every story seemed real. It was nice for adults to read bedtime stories and for pictures to be looked at for so long that they would be remembered for a lifetime. Once you see those same illustrations in a reprint or on tattered pages in a second-hand bookstore, your heart feels warm, like meeting an old friend. It’s nice when the spines of your favorite childhood books appear on the shelf at home. But at some point I discovered that you can go one step further. Behind most of the illustrations that we love so much and that are sold in print, there is an original – the work of the artist. And these works will perfectly complement the art collection.
I think that book illustration is an underrated genre, as if there is a whole chasm between a painting in a museum and an image in a book. Moreover, we are talking about books that can be found in the home library or bought, and there will be those images that you like so much. But in reality this is the same as saying: “Why go to the Viktor Vasnetsov Museum when you can buy a good album?” An illustrator does a great job; he does not just embody a fantasy: it is important for him to know the text thoroughly in order to be able to convey all the halftones and emotions. And the result is works that are valuable even outside the pages of the book, in an elegant frame on the wall.
The works of illustrators rarely become auction hits – perhaps it is a niche story. Unless, of course, we are talking about modern books, which are becoming not just literature, but a commercial project. Just the other day there was news about the sale of the original watercolor for the cover of the first Harry Potter book at Sotheby’s in New York. In the case of the Potter series, one could not count on a cheap purchase: the illustration sold for 1.9 million dollars, and is the most expensive thing related to the wizarding story ever sold at auction. The value of this watercolor work lies precisely in the fact that it became part of a great success story. Illustrator Thomas Taylor was still a young novice when he created the drawing, and this was his first official commission.
But don’t think that truly interesting book illustrations are limited to expensive lots only. In Russia we are very lucky: the best of the best have been involved in children’s illustration in our country at different times. Ivan Bilibin, Vladimir Suteev, Evgeny Charushin, Vladimir Panov, Ivan Semenov, Arnold Tambovkin, Elena Los (the list goes on and on) were truly great artists. And you can look for their works for sale and pick them up yourself as soon as possible.
