George Baxter and Abraham Le Blond

George Baxter and Abraham Le Blond - The Crystal Palace And Gardens or, Baxter's Gems of the Crystal Palace, No. 3 (Le Blond - Baxter Print): The famous Crystal Palace opened to the public in 1854. During this year both Baxter and the Le Blond Brothers published exterior and interior views of the building. The most remarkable view of them all is The Crystal Palace and Gardens, or, Baxter's Gems of the Crystal Palace, No. 3, initially printed and published by George Baxter in 1854 and reprinted by Abraham Le Blond around 1868. As stated earlier this original impression hails from the Le Blond 1868 edition.

An original oil print by Le Blond & Company, The Crystal Palace and Gardens is noteworthy for several reasons. This 1854 view of the Crystal Palace, Sydenham, features the five fantastic sculptures by Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins. An illustrator, etcher, painter and sculptor, Hawkins (1807-1894) was appointed director of the fossil department at the Crystal Palace. In collaboration with Richard Owen, he created these concrete creatures based upon then newly found fossil remains. They thus represent one of the earliest attempts to portray the extinct world of the dinosaur.

Secondly this particular impression of The Crystal Palace and Gardens vividly illustrates the often confusing and sometimes deceiving world of the Baxter process print. George Baxter's famous colour prints drew both rivals and deliberate attempts to forge his work. He created, printed and published The Crystal Palace and Gardens in 1854. Shortly after Baxter's death in 1867 Abraham Le Blond acquired 66 sets of his original plates and blocks and republished the prints under his own name. These works, printed by Le Blond from the original Baxter plates are usually termed, 'Le Blond - Baxters'. Such is here the case.

For almost a century and a half unscrupulous art dealers have been actively disguising 'Le Blond - Baxters' as first edition Baxter prints. The earliest and most popular method appears to have been simply cropping the bottom margin and thus eliminating Le Blond's signature. As well, around 1920, an understandably anonymous dealer created his own rubber stamp which reads, "Published Oct. 7th 1854 by G. Baxter Proprietor and Patentee London". In this impression this can be seen to the lower right, stamped at an angle. The original Baxter impression, however, bears these words in the lower left, "Published Octr. 30th 1854, by G. Baxter, Proprietor & Patentee, London."

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