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I started this page thinking that I would tackle W.Cat.392 (see this) however when reading Barber's notes about that binding, we find a reference to Gruel's page 141. Lets look first at Gruel's page 140, here we find an interesting statement about the inner dentelle roulette of the binding that he was referring to Les fêtes données au Roy a Strasbourg 1744, and included a reproduction of it on page 141. Here is my translation of this text: "The inner dentelle roulette, which is of exquisite taste and extreme finesse, could be considered a kind of signature on its own; for I do not know that it was ever employed by anyone but him. His contemporaries, and even Louis Douceur (2 3 4 5), who after him had the quality of Ordinary Bookbinder of the King, could not reach the perfection of his work; their bindings have always been getting heavier (excessively charged with elaborate detail), and his lovely dentelles have been completely misrepresented. I must however recognize that Derome (3) knew how to maintain in relative perfection of this kind of gilding that the great Master had raised so high". To me, there are two things that we can deduct from this, first that Gruel has confused the decoration of Dubuisson for that of Padeloup due to Padeloup tickets in bindings that he paid Dubuisson to decorate and secondly that he mistakenly believed that Derome acquired Padeloup's tools which explains the similarity of Derome's work. He is right though that the inner dentelle roulette ROLL 81 can be viewed as a kind of signature, a Dubuisson signature. Note: Gruel was then, actually referring to Dubuisson and not Padeloup as the great Master. . Looking now at Barber's notes on W.Cat.744 (shown above) we see a reference to ROLL 81. When I first started examining W.Cat.774, I thought to myself, ah ha! How is Barber going to explain all the Dubuisson imprints found in the decoration of this binding? This should certainly be his undoing, but no, Barber simply ignores them, failing to mention them at all. But even if he did, he would simply claim that these derive from the tools of Padeloup, as he has for the other tools. This, however, does not make any sense because we can easily demonstrate that Dubuisson was using these same tools for most of his career. I show these below in Comparative Diagrams 1 and 2. Note: BV 7 is also a Dubuisson tool (see this) |
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In comparative Diagram 4, I show Gruel's reproduction of Les fêtes données au Roy a Strasbourg 1744 compared with a binding that you can find in the online catalogue of ARTCURIAL (see this). This is a multi-plaque Dubuisson binding covering a publication entitled Représentations des fêtes données par la ville de Strasbourg Paris, Laurent Aubert, [1747]. This ARTCURIAL page is exceptional, showing us enlarged reproductions from this book including the title page with Padeloup's signature ticket, and most importantly, a view of Dubuisson's ROLL 81. |
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| Even experts are sometimes wrong, before you spend thousands on a book, please do your own research! Just because I say a certain binding can be attributed to le Maitre isn't any kind of guarantee, don't take my word for it, go a step further and get your own proof. In these pages I have provided you with a way of doing just that. |
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