Title from engraved title plate; collection of etchings comprised of impressions in various states, printed on different papers and, despite the presence of the "Picart" title page, evidently assembled from different sources by a collecter and mounted into a bound album by former owner.
Watermarks are not discernible owing to the mounting of the plates on the album leaves.
Individual prints comprising this album have been cataloged separately (see: PML 4350.1-63).
Engraved calligraphic title-plate with parallel titles in Dutch and French; the first state, as issued by Bernard Picart, with "compleet" instead of "complet", the word "alles" in the fourth line, and "de" in place of "van" in the French text. Cf. Godefroy.
Album of 63 etchings by van Ostade, evidently compiled by collecter Achille Seilliere and comprising his complete oeuvre of 50 etchings, with the addition of the apocryphal piece, "A Woman Catching Fleas", for a total of 51 individual etchings, along with additional copies of 12 prints representing different states, for a total of 63 prints.
Prints are glued down at the corners to bound album leaves, with many of them closely trimmed to the platemark or to the image.
Album does not include the mezzotint portrait of Ostade by Jacob Gole frequently found in albums of the artist's complete etched works.
Oeuvre complet d'Adriaen de Ostade, peintre célebre, inventé & gravé par luy-même
Inscribed in pencil on verso of front binder's leaf: Finest collection of Ostade proofs extant / Made by Baron Mello / see his pencil notes; annotated throughout with notes in pencil below the individual prints.