Lost art

This is Spencerian penmanship. I sure wish I'd been taught how to write beautifully, but it was already a lost art in the 1960s. Of course, there are a few people who still do it.

Daniel T. Ames

From Ames' Guide to Self-Instruction in Practical and Artistic Penmanship, 1884. There is no biography of Ames on wikipedia!

L'Art arabe (1877)

From the NYPL Digital Gallery. A book illustrating Arabic ornamentation, architecture, etc. Very beautiful. I love these old ornamentation catalogs.

Ornamentation madness

Segaud, Armand -- Artist
Pluviôse : les poissons.
From Album de la Décoration. (Paris : Librairie des Arts Decoratifs,) Calavas, A., editor.

Art Nouveau door design
Kühnel, Richard -- Artist
Moderne Wanddekoration mit Kunstverglasungen (1889-1928)

Persian rug
From Das polychrome Ornament : hundert Tafeln, Gold-, Silber- und Farben-Druck . . . antike und orientalische Kunst : Mittelalter Renaissance, XVII und XVIII Jahrhundert : eine historische und praktische sammlung. (Stuttgart : Paul Neff, 1874.) Racinet, A. (Auguste) (1825-1893), author.

All at NYPL Digital gallery.

NYPL Digital again

Grüner, Ludwig, 1801-1882 -- Artist
Part of an ancient pilaster in the Villa Medici at Rome.
The French bean and the convolvolus from nature.
In: Specimens of ornamental art, selected from the best models of the classical epochs. (created 1850)

Studies in Design (1876)

More NYPL madness!

The NYPL Digital library continues to amaze. There are so many scans of ornamentation. This one looks absolutely three-dimensional.

Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám - Elihu Vedder

From the moment of its publication, Elihu Vedder's Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám achieved unparalleled success. The first edition appeared in Boston on 8 November 1884; six days later, it was sold out. Critics rushed to acclaim it as a masterwork of American art, and Vedder (1836 - 1923) as the master American artist. (from Smithsonian website)

NYPL Digital Gallery

I just discovered this amazing gallery of illustrations. It's clearly worth many visits. This is an illustration of Mytilus stagnalis by James Sowerby. I guess that means mussels. http://digitalgallery.nypl.org