Book Illustrations by Arthur Rackham

Arthur Rackham was an English illustrator of the golden age of book illustration born in London in 1867. He was the fourth child of twelve of a civil servant and was encouraged to paint from an early age. When about 16 years old he was sent on a long sea voyage all the way to Australia in the attempt to improve his poor health at the time.

When he returned from Australia he enrolled to the Lambeth School of Art where his work was very much admired. Although his dream was to earn a living as an artist, he had to work as a clerk for seven years to have a steady income. In the meantime he sent his illustrations to several publishers until he was offered a position as an illustrator at the Pall Mall Budget.

From then on, he started to receive many commission to illustrate books, especially children's books and started to make a name for himself not only for his artistic talent but also for his reliability; the ability to respect deadlines was much appreciated by publishers. The advances in colour printing meant that his illustrations could also include more details and colours. Partly because the dominant technique at the time was the three-colour separation process his illustrations have a soft water-coloured look. Rackham was always influenced by his surroundings when illustrating scenes and landscapes and his work was much affected by his holidays to the English countryside as much as his journeys in several European countries.

He married Edyth, a fairly successful portrait painter and only one of their children survived, Barbara who was born in 1908. Although Rackham achieved success and fame in his lifetime they lived a fairly simple and frugal life but was on friendly terms with many artists and intellectuals of the time in London. With the First World War the Golden Age of Illustration ended in Britain but Rackham continued to illustrate books until just before his death in 1939. In later years he seemed to regret to have worked solely in what was after all considered a minor art: book illustration.

Arthur Rackham illustrated many classics of children's literature such as:

Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm , 1900

Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens , 1903

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland , 1907

Aesop's Fables, 1912

Mother Goose, 1913

The Wind in the Willows, 1940

But also illustrated plays and poems such as:

A Midsummer Night's Dream , 1908

Comus , 1922

The Tempest , 1926

Peer Gynt , 1936

All the images on this page come from Wikimedia Commons and are in the Public Domain. Arthur Rackham died in 1939 therefore according  to both the rule of work created before 1923 (U.S. law) and the rule of 70 years after death (E.U.law) determine that his work is now in the Public Domain.