Artwork Page for The Queen of Sheba

Details / Information for The Queen of Sheba

Series Title: L’Illustration

The Queen of Sheba

1911
(British, 1882–1953)
Support
Artist's drawing board
Measurements
Sheet: 31.6 x 25.4 cm (12 7/16 x 10 in.)
Credit Line
Public Domain
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Location
Not on view
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Did You Know?

Edmund Dulac was such a devoted Anglophile that as a student his contemporaries referred to him as "l'Anglais" (English).

Description

A celebrated artist of the golden age of British book illustration, the French-born Edmund Dulac was inspired by Persian miniatures and manuscript illustration. This watercolor was one of a series of four scenes painted to accompany a poem by André Dumas, Figures of the Orient. Dulac depicted legendary enchantresses of the East: Circe, Salome, Scheherazade, and here, the Queen of Sheba. Aloft a camel, the dark-haired beauty languorously surveys the arid landscape as she and her entourage approach the Holy Land. Vibrant silks spill out of the queen’s gold and lapis howdah, a veritable mosaic of texture and pattern.
A vertically oriented pen and watercolor drawing depicts a woman with a light skin tone seated in a blue and gold domed enclosure atop a light tan camel. She wears a patterned blue robe and a plumed turban, holding a blue fan. The camel is led by a man in a white turban at the bottom right. In the background, white buildings sit beneath a hazy blue and tan sky.

The Queen of Sheba

1911

Edmund Dulac

(British, 1882–1953)
England, 20th century

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