*THEOPHILE ALEXANDRE STEINLEN (1859-1923 ) Gil Blas illustrated. From n° 1, 1st year, June 28, 1891, to n° 51, 12th year, December 19, 1902. Bound in 6 vol. in-fol. [285 x 380]. Contributions from Willy, Edmond Char, Jules Lévy, Tristan Bernard, Maurice Leblanc and J.-H. Rosny. Illustrated with reproductions (gillotages) of drawings by Chéret, Sandy-Hook, Jacques Villon, Steinlen, Weiluc, Moriss, Georges Redon, Gottlob, Prejelan... Well preserved copies, slightly yellowed (as usual). Half-bound in garnet percaline, marbled paper boards, five-ribbed spine, gilt title. "In 1891, a major daily newspaper, Gil Blas, launched its literary supplement. Each issue contained at least one large color drawing by Steinlen, illustrating a story or a song; in a few years, it gave more than four hundred pages, each of which revealed the intelligence deployed by its author to animate a text, interpret it plastically, reconstitute the characters of a story, the setting and the environment in which they evolve. [The success of the Gil Blas Illustré is undoubtedly due to Steinlen, who is now famous, and above all to a certain sentimentality, very apparent in this observer whose realism does not repudiate the romance of the suburbs. (Francis Jourdain, Un grand imagier. Alexandre Steinlen, Paris, Cercle d'Art, 1954, quoted by Sylvie Gonzalez and Raphaële Martin-Pigalle, "Le quotidien à la une du quotidien", in Daumier, Steinlen, Toulouse-Lautrec, La Vie au quotidien, exhibition catalog, Évian, Palais Lumière, Paris, Somogy, 2011, p. 182). All lots in this sale are subject to an additional 5.5% temporary import tax. In the event of re-exportation outside the European Union, these charges may be refunded to the buyer.