DALI (Salvador). Suite des planches pour La Divine comédie de Dante. [Paris, Les Heures claires, 1959-1963]. - 100 plates 330 x 262, in sheets mounted in mounts, publisher's blue, red and violet folder and slipcase. Precious suite containing in 3 volumes the reproduction of the 100 watercolours in colour created by Salvador DALI (1904-1989) to illustrate Dante's Divine Comedy. Under the direction of Jean Estrade for Les Heures Claires publishing house, master engraver Raymond Jacquet, assisted by Jean Taricco and Paul Bassin, undertook the titanic task of transposing Salvador Dalí's 100 watercolours for The Divine Comedy into a series of woodcuts between 1959 and 1963. Each watercolour was broken down into its chromatic components, requiring the creation of a separate block of wood for each colour - sometimes more than 30 per image. The process began with the precise transfer of the original drawing to the block, using lithographic techniques, followed by an absolutely rigorous burin engraving. Each line had to perfectly match the nuances and contours of Dalí's works, under his attentive and demanding eye. A total of 3,500 blocks were engraved, each of which had to be inked and pressed with millimetre precision to reproduce the richness of the watercolours. The alignment of the colours, the depth of the incisions and the quality of the paper were essential to obtain prints of exceptional fidelity and beauty. This suite on Rives vellum, with the artist's signature in the plate, whose exact edition is not specified, was not designed to accompany the 6 volumes of text; it was sold separately. A perfectly preserved copy.