?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 5,000 - $ 7,500
(AMERICAN ENGRAVING.) Amos Doolittle; artist and engraver. The complete Prodigal Son series:The Prodigal Son Receiving his Patrimony / The Prodigal Son Revelling with Harlots / The Prodigal Son in Misery / The Prodigal Son Returned to his Father. 4 hand-colored engravings. Each about 14 1/2 x 10 1/2 inches, toning, minor edge wear, tack holes in corners, #2 trimmed a bit tighter with 4 early repaired closed tears and heavier toning and mount remnant on top edge recto. Can ship with period frames lined with fragments of early newspaper. Cheshire, CT: Shelton & Kensett, 1814
Amos Doolittle (1754-1832) was one of the pioneers of American engraving, best known for his eye-witness images of the American Revolution. These representations of the parable of the Prodigal Son depict a young wastrel receiving an inheritance, squandering it in a tavern, sitting in tattered clothes among swine, and then begging his father for forgiveness. "Presented with utter sincerity and resultant effectiveness"--Shadwell, American Printmaking 112-3. D'Oench, Prodigal Son Narratives 21; Fowble 353-6; O'Brien, Doolittle pages 79-85; Stauffer, American Engravers 539-541 ("Patrimony" not recorded).
