The Picture of Dorian Gray

In 1968, Ohio-born artist Jim Dine produced a book of lithographs after Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray. Fashioned as a working script for an unrealized play based on the late 19th-century novel, the volume features original images by Dine as well as his notes on the text. The limited edition book showcases the costumes that Dine was developing for the stage production. In a 1979 interview, Dine discussed his green velvet- covered creation:

"As an object itself the book’s quite pretty, I think, and it’s one of the most indulged things I ever made. In a certain way that’s how Dorian Gray was—completely indulged—and that’s why I felt it was in keeping."

In Wilde’s tale, a handsome young man named Dorian Gray wishes that his painted portrait could age instead of his body. While the protagonist remains perpetually youthful and beautiful, the portrait registers the debilitating effects of Gray’s increasingly debauched and hedonistic lifestyle.