[LACE. WWI]. Comité de la dentelle. DENTELLES !

A poignant plea for both the lace industry and the besieged women and children facing hardship under the Germany occupation that had begun the year prior to the publication of this catalog.

[LACE]. Mussche, Paul. Comité de la dentelle. DENTELLES !

[Bruxelles, Imp. J.-E. Goossens, (c.1915)]

(38.5 x 28 cm). [12] pp., five of which are full-page color illustrations of lace patterns and women's clothing

with a starting title, including 5 plates in color and black showing. With illustrations signed by “E. Drot 1915”.

Lovely folio catalog illustrated with examples of current fashions (c.1915) in lace fabric and clothing and an appeal for the benefit of the lacemakers of Belgium during wartime. OCLC lists one copy.

The catalog was published under the auspices of the Comité Belge de la Dentelle / Belgian Lace Committee, the members of which are listed at the inside cover, headed by Madame Brand Whitlock, the wife of the American Ambassador, a gesture both honorary and strategic: Ambassador Whitlock was credited as an influential and valuable diplomat in Europe during WWI.

The text by Paul Mussche, which addresses potential customers for Belgian lace, paints a complicated portrait of the women lace workers of Belguim during the war, and states quite clearly the purpose of this publication:

"And thus, the raison d'être of the catalog that you hold in your hand. Ladies, read through the pages. The cover has already foretold the goal we want to achieve: simply to feed these hungry children for whose meal this little Flemish lacemaker has already stretched her resources thin...*

The sketch that the artist has drawn is pretty; it is amiable and paired with the illustrations that follow it. If you knew how different reality is from this painting, and to this Greuze, I hesitate to substitute it with a Goya that would make you shudder!

*“Voilà la raison d'être du catalogue que vous tenez en main. Mesdames, parcourez-en les feuillets. La couverture vous a déjà averties du but que nous voulons atteindre : tout simplement donner à manger à ces enfants qui ont faim et pour le repas desquels cette petite dentellière flamande a repoussé son carreau…”