Collection: Gustave Doré Engravings

Gustave Doré engravings: the great illustrator of the 19th century

Gustave Doré (1832–1883) was the most famous illustrator of his time. Born in Strasbourg, he published his first album as a teenager and went on to illustrate Dante, the Bible, Don Quixote, Coleridge, Ariosto and La Fontaine. His drawings were cut into wood by teams of engravers, and their dramatic contrasts of black and white still feel like film stills today.

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

For Coleridge’s poem (1876), Doré imagined a ghostly voyage: the ship trapped in the ice, the albatross that brings bad luck after it is shot, and the rotting sea under a burning sky.

Orlando Furioso: knights and hippogriffs

Ariosto’s epic poem of chivalry inspired some of Doré’s most fantastic images: a knight on a hippogriff, Astolfo and the hippogriff above an army, and Astolfo on the Hippogriff, from canto XXXIV, where the knight flies off in search of Orlando’s lost wits.

The Bible and La Fontaine

Doré’s illustrated Bible (1866) made him famous across Europe, and Death on the Pale Horse, from the Book of Revelation, is one of its most powerful plates; his Dante is explored in our article Doré’s Inferno, circle by circle. In a lighter register, his illustrations for La Fontaine’s Fables include The Oak and the Reed, The Cicada and the Ant and The Wolves and the Sheep: see our La Fontaine’s Fables collection.

Hanging a Gustave Doré print

Doré’s engravings were made to be read up close and seen from afar. A large format suits a living room or a staircase, while a series of three illustrations from the same book makes a striking set in a study or a library. Black frames and wide white mats keep the crispness of the line.

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