[Blasco Ibáñez, Vicente]Quinn, Paul (1910–1957). The Four Horsemen of the Apocylypse [sic]. Original cover design, circa 1930. Gouache on illustration board. The image is 13½ x 14¾ in on illustration board 14½ x 20 in. Loss and stain to upper left margin: very good overall.

An original painting for the cover of Blasco-Ibáñez's celebrated novel (the title of which is here alarmingly misspelled!). Paul Vincent Quinn, a Boston-based commercial artist trained at the Massachusetts School of Art and Design, executed cover paintings and interior illustrations in the 1930s and 1940s for books from a number of publishers, including Page and Houghton Mifflin. We presume this design represents student work, though it may have been planned for an unissued reprint: the aesthetic here hearkens to the house style for the paperback "Bonibooks" series issued between 1929 and 1931.

Paul Quinn, 1931

The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse is one of the great novels of World War I, centering on the French and German sons-in-law of an Argentinian land-owner who find themselves fighting on opposite sides of the conflict.  The English translation was the top-selling book in the United States when it was first published in 1919.  The 1921 film adaptation starred Rudolph Valentino. Quinn's nightmarish cover design sidesteps the romantic aspects of the story to focus on the violent upheavals of the war.

Rudolph Valentino feigning insouciance in Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (1921)