Artists' Books and Rare Books for Sale » Books About Books

Benjamin Fawcett: 1808-1893. Engraver and Colour Printer. With a List of his Books and plates. By Ruari and Antonia McLean.

wstahl — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 13:36:52 +0000

(Benjamin Fawcett) Benjamin Fawcett: 1808-1893. Engraver and Colour Printer. With a List of his Books and plates. By Ruari and Antonia McLean. Scolar Press. [Aldershot. Hampshire. 1988.] 196p. 11” x 7”. 9 color plates, 36 illustrations in black and white; many taken from extremely rare or unique originals which had never before been published. Green cloth over board, title in gilt on spine. Dust jacket. One in an edition of 750 copies. As new.

Benjamin Fawcett was the outstanding English woodblock color printer of the nineteenth century. The book contains a checklist of all known publications containing plates by Fawcett. His life, color woodblock techniques and popular scientific publishing in the nineteenth century are discussed.

(Farrand Press) Pictures to Print: The Nineteenth Century Engraving Trade — By Antony Dyson

wstahl — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 13:32:40 +0000

(Farrand Press) Pictures to Print: The Nineteenth Century Engraving Trade. By Antony Dyson. London. 1984. Frontispiece, xxx, 234p, 95 illustrations, glossary, bibliography, index. 10” x 8”. With a hand-colored frontispiece chosen from the Ross collection. Printed on a special antique paper. Bound in half brown leather and brown buckram over boards; title in gilt on front cover and spine; t.e.g.; brown silk ribbon marker. One of 100 special copies thus, signed by Anthony Dyson, Paula Allerton and R.A. Farrand. Prospectus laid-in as well as signed letter from the publisher. Fine.

James Moran — The Double Crown Club: A History of Fifty Years

wstahl — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 00:21:47 +0000

(James Moran) The Double Crown Club: A History of Fifty Years. By James Moran. Westerham Press. London. 1974. viii, 125p. 11.5″ x 8″. Black and white illustrations. Brown cloth boards; title in gilt on spine. Matching slipcase. One in an edition of 500 copies signed by James Moran. As new.

The Double Crown Club “has acted as a catalyst in the transformation of graphic communication, a matter of no small importance to modern civilisation. The club can also be seen as a microcosm of half a century of change in taste and outlook in printing and the graphic arts.” – Prologue.

John DePol: A Catalogue Raisonné of his Graphic Work 1935-1998

wstahl — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 21:38:54 +0000

([tag]John DePol/tag]) John DePol: A Catalogue Raisonné of his Graphic Work 1935-1998. Compiled and edited by James Howard Fraser and Eleanor Friedl. Foreword by Donald R. Fleming. Preface by John Dreyfus and A Biographical Essay by Catherine Tyler Brody. The Book Club of California. 2001. 162p. 12.25” x 9.25”. Color and black-and-white reproductions throughout. Designed and printed by James Wehlage at the Tuscan Press, California. Printed on Mohawk Superfine, with text in Adobe Caslon. Illustrations scanned and printed by offset at the Tuscan Press. Bound with patterned rust paper boards: black cloth spine with silver title. Printed in an edition of 400 copies. Gray paper board slipcase with silver title on black spine. Fine.

The catalogue includes books, selected pamphlets, fifty etchings;, 20 lithographs, more than 100 wood engravings, and many posters.

Twentieth Century Type Designers. New Edition. By Sebastian Carter

wstahl — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 21:34:38 +0000

(Sebastian Carter) Twentieth Century Type Designers. New Edition. By Sebastian Carter. W.W. Norton & Company. New York. London. 1995. 192p., includes Index. 9.5” x 9.25”. Black-and-white illustrations and examples of typefaces throughout. Black buckram boards with silver gilt title on spine; illustrated dust jacket. Fine.

“Since its first publication in 1987, Twentieth Century Type Designers has become a standard reference work for typographers, designers and students alike. This new edition includes an examination of the latest technological developments in the design and composition of type, and introduces the work of some of the more recent designers to have made their mark in this century.” – Dust jacket.

“Sebastian Carter was born in 1941, and educated at King’s College, Cambridge. In 1971 he won the first Francis Minns Award, given by the National Book League to a designer singled out by the judges at the annual British book design and production exhibition.” – Dust jacket.

Carter has written several books in his field, as well as contributing to ‘The Times Literary Supplement”, “Crafts”, “Matrix” and “Eye”.

Contemporary Calligraphy. Modern Scribes and Lettering Artists II. Trefoil Books

wstahl — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 21:30:34 +0000

(Calligraphy) Contemporary Calligraphy. Modern Scribes and Lettering Artists II. Trefoil Books. London. 1986. 168p. 11” x 8.75”. Brown buckram with title in gilt on spine. Dust jacket. Fine. Related posts:Augustino Da Siena: The 1568 Edition of His Writing Book in Facsimile. By Alfred J. Fairbank Twentieth Century Type Designers. New Edition. By Sebastian Carter Benjamin Fawcett: 1808-1893. Engraver [...] Related posts:

Augustino Da Siena: The 1568 Edition of His Writing Book in Facsimile. By Alfred J. Fairbank

wstahl — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 21:29:42 +0000

(Calligraphy) Augustino Da Siena: The 1568 Edition of His Writing Book in Facsimile. By Alfred J. Fairbank. The Merrion Press. London. 1975. 21p, facsimile. 9.625” x 6.75”. Gold cloth over board, device on front cover in gilt; title in gilt on spine. Dust jacket. An edition of 750 copies. Prospectus laid-in. Fine.

A Check-list of the Book Illustrations of John Buckland Wright Together with a Personal Memoir. By Anthony Reid

wstahl — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 21:25:14 +0000

(John Buckland Wright) A Check-list of the Book Illustrations of John Buckland Wright Together with a Personal Memoir. By Anthony Reid. Private Libraries Association. Pinner, Middlesex. 1968. 94p., 16 plates. 10” x 6.25”. Bound in blue buckram. The front cover decoration was designed by John Buckland Wright for the author; title in gilt within red panel. An edition of 1400 copies, of which half are for sale. Two cuttings tipped-into front endpapers with clear tape. Very good.

“John Buckland Wright (1897-1954) was born in New Zealand and educated at Rugby and Oxford. He taught himself wood engravings after having read Gordon Craig’s Woodcuts and Some Words (1924) and began illustrating books in 1930. He illustrated some seventy-five books, providing for them upwards of five hundred engravings, and he designed the dust-wrappers for an additional nine volumes.

“Wright was a perfectionist, …who had the intelligence, imagination, and art to illustrate the masterpieces of English literature with dignity and beauty.
“The volume is finely produced, with its pages illustrated by 20 reproductions of Wright’s wood-engravings and the plates superbly reproducing 16 of his copper-engravings.” – Cutting inside book.

Robert Bridges — The Necessity of Poetry

wstahl — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 21:21:02 +0000

(Robert Bridges) The Necessity of Poetry. An Address given to the Tredegar & District Co-operative Society Nov. 22, 1917, by Robert Bridges, Poet Laureate. Clarendon Press. Oxford. 1918. 48p. 8” x 5”. Blue paper wrappers, title in blue on front cover. Edges slightly worn, else extremely good.

Dorothea Braby — The Way of Wood Engravings

wstahl — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 21:18:01 +0000

(Dorothea Braby) The Way of Wood Engravings. By Dorothea Braby. Associate Member of the Society of Wood Engravers. The Studio Publications. London & New York.1953. 96p., includes Index. 10” x 7.5”. Black and white wood engravings throughout. Red buckram boards with black title on spine. Illustrated dust jacket. Slight wear to dust jacket spine, minor offset to front free endpaper, else very good.

How to do it Series Number 46.
“Full of her own feeling for the craft and illustrated by some of [Dorothea Braby’s] favourite plates, it is yet an essentially practical book: it covers a wide survey of materials, detailed advice on preparation for work, the textures and range of effects which the tools possess and the taking of a print. A specimen subject has been taken through from the first rough sketch to printed block, showing its development at every stage.” – Dust jacket.
Many great examples of work by John Buckland-Wright, M. C. Escher, John Farleigh, Robert Gibbings, Eric Gill, Joan Hassall, Gertrude Hermes, Blair Hughes-Stanton, Claire Leighton, Gwen Raverat, Eric Ravilious, and other famous wood engravers.