Book Review: The American Weekly Covers of Edmund Dulac 1924-1951
The American Weekly Covers of Edmund Dulac 1924-1951: 106 Full Color Covers Collectors Edition by Albert Seligman
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
To slightly warp what Indiana Jones once said about priceless artifacts, the gorgeous watercolor paintings created by Edmund Dulac for The American Weekly magazine belong in a museum. But the original paintings have vanished into private collections, with no treasure map left behind to give clues to their locations.
But when Albert Seligman, fueled by his passion for Dulac’s work, went searching for any trace of the cover art, he was rewarded with an ‘Indy moment’. He discovered that the Academy of Comic Art in San Francisco had a complete collection of The American Weekly magazines. His dream of making Dulac’s cover illustrations accessible to everyone was finally within reach.
But it was the 1990s, and the technology needed to capture high-quality images digitally was still rudimentary, and not easily accessible by just anyone. So instead, Seligman convinced the museum to let him take all the magazines with covers by Edmund Dulac away to be professionally photographed.
It would be a long while before those photographs were digitally scanned and published in this gem of a book. I especially loved the Arabian Nights artwork, but every painting is marvelous, and will no doubt transport you to another time, another reality.
My thanks to Albert Seligman for turning his passion into action, making sure that generations to come will have access to this artwork.
Lori Alden Holuta
Lori Alden Holuta lives between the cornfields of Mid-Michigan, where she grows vegetables and herbs when she’s not writing, editing, or playing games with a cat named Chives.
