“Treasure Island”, endpaper illustration
Today feels like a pirate sort of day…
“Treasure Island” is an oil on canvas painting by the American illustrator, N. C. Wyeth. This piece was created for Charles Scribner’s Son’s 1911 edition of Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson. This is one of 16 oil paintings that Wyeth illustrated for the book. This piece served as the endpaper illustration, printed on the front and back inside covers. Wyeth completed this painting in April 1911.
In this piece, Wyeth depicts a group of pirates marching forward along a sandy beach, with swords, guns, picks, and shovels in hand. Everything is painted in black and white, except for a vibrant yellow filling in the background. Two seagulls stand out against the yellow sky. The pirates are dressed in what today is considered a typical pirate costume, with bandanas, hooped earrings, and eighteenth-century sailors’ hats on their heads. He painted on large-scale canvases, which allowed beautiful and detailed reproductions. Wyeth did a lot of research for these pieces, using models and props to help bring his visions to life.
Treasure Island was the story that popularized many aspects of pirate lore, including the character of Long John Silver, the dreaded black spot, eye patches, parrots on shoulders, peg legs, and maps with an “x” marking the location of buried treasure. The entirety of the book can be viewed online here.
This publication of Treasure Island was a commercial success. In 1908, Wyeth had moved with his family to Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, in a house along the Brandywine Creek. In 1911, he used the proceeds from the book to pay off both his house and studio. Additionally, he came to notoriety after this publication, which was his first major commissioned illustration. This jump-started Wyeth’s career of illustrating classic literature books for a new young audience.
“Treasure Island”, endpaper illustration, is currently in the collections of the Brandywine Museum of Art in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, in the United States. This museum houses a fantastic collection of American illustrators, including Howard Pyle, N. C. Wyeth, and Andrew Wyeth.
For more on N. C. Wyeth, please visit his short biography here.
You can find more artists to learn about here.
