An analytical study of the most important examples of book cover artists and designers from the nineteenth century to the twenty-first century

Ibrahim, Salma Abd Elaziz Abd Elaal; Allam, Mahmoud Mustafa; Samir, Ahmed Mohamed

doi:10.21608/mjaf.2023.226747.3155

An analytical study of the most important examples of book cover artists and designers from the nineteenth century to the twenty-first century

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

¹ Master&#039;s student, Faculty of Fine Arts, Graphic Department, Animation and Book Arts Division, Luxor University

² Assistant Professor in the Graphic Department and Vice Dean of the Faculty of Fine Arts for Postgraduate Studies and Research ,Luxor University

³ Graphics lecturur, Faculty of Fine Arts ,Luxor University

10.21608/mjaf.2023.226747.3155

Abstract

The first beginnings of the emergence of the book were the attempts of prehistoric man with drawings that he used to line the walls of caves, which served as the first foundation for the emergence of the book and writing. After the invention of writing, the copied book began, and remained until the invention of the printing press in the fifteenth century AD. The books that were printed a year ago 1500 AD, where historians refer to it as (Incunabula), which is the Latin word meaning (in the cradle). These books were often large and thick, bound with covers of thin wood covered with calfskin. Many of these books were decorated with large initials written by hand at the beginning. Chapters, and decorations on the edges of the pages. The book did not have a title page at the top, but the printer would leave a white space at the top of the first page of the book, in which a calligrapher would usually write the title in red ink. This title would include the name of the book and the author’s name along with the Latin word (Incipit), which means ( Here the book begins) and the book ends with a closing statement, including a few words indicating the place of publication of the book, its date, and the name of the printer..

For hundreds of years the use of a book cover served as a protective device for the handmade pages, as the book cover was not designed to market the interior material, but today book covers are used as a form of marketing and an insight into the content of the book, as the role of the book cover began to shape itself more through Arts and Crafts and Art Nouveau movements At the beginning of the 20th century, these movements began to infiltrate the growing book industry through the development of publishing houses in Europe, London and New York.

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