In their broadest sense, the book arts are at the core of our inventory. To be sure, the category encompasses the specialties that you see on our homepage, such as Fine Printing, Fine Binding, and Illustrated Books. However, it also includes such things as writing books and calligraphy, fore-edge paintings, books on papermaking, and leaf books.
Read more about one of the book arts, Fore-edge Painting
(San Francisco & Santa Barbara: Paul Elder & Co., 1909). Quarto. Frenchfold. 22ff. First and only edition. Pictorial title page and colophon, decorated copyright page, and 19 illustrations by Robert Wilson Hyde, all printed in color and gold. Considered one of the highlights of Paul Elder's publications, this is one..... More
(N.p. 1910. 16mo. (ii), 60, (4)pp. A lush hand-embellished prayer book, with an array of finely executed original illustrations, including three full-page compositions and around fifty smaller miniatures representing architectural, pastoral, theological, and ecological subjects. Each spread receives a unique border, illuminated and using a vast variety of colors, all..... More
(N.p.): Cat Skinner Press, 2006. Five etchings here evince learned and detailed attention to the fine shapes and shadows of plants. At the colophon, Briony Morrow-Cribs identifies each plant: lilium martagon, anthoxanthum odoratum, liriodendron tulipifera, tigridia meleagris, and dianthus superbus cardneri. Octavo. (7)ff loose. One of twenty copies, signed and..... More
Lewiston, ME: Bates College Museum of Art, 1999. Oblong octavo. 77pp. One of 200 copies, signed by Claire Van Vliet. Replete with reproductions of Van Vliet's lithographs, drawings, etchings, and other works. Interview transcript with Van Vliet at the back, along with a catalogue of her works and associated bibliography..... More
Cambridge, MA: Runcible Books, (1977). 48mo. Ten cards. One of forty copies, signed by Parry on the colophon card. Eight of the cards feature fanciful drawings of signature Bostonians, reproduced by Xerox and hand-colored by the artist. All held in a Cockerell-covered portfolio. Fine. More
(Houston, TX: ImpPress, 1965). Small octavo. (12)ff. One of 150 copies, signed by the artist and printer, Dugald Stermer. A quirky type specimen book printed on various colors of paper, in many colors of ink. With full-page illustrations, including a cartoonish frontispiece of a man with a printing press in..... More
Petrograd: Gosudarstvennoe Izdatel'stvo, (1920). Framed poster measuring 19 inches by 26 inches. This two-color lithograph was printed in Petrograd (now St. Petersburg) by the Petrograd State Publishing House and shows a man and a woman reading books while a hammer rests against the man's leg and more books lay in..... More
Newark, VT: Janus Press, 2011. Twenty-four 16mo. chapbooks, housed in quarto trifold portfolio. Each chapbook (8)ff. One of 120 copies, signed by Peter Schumann, whose charcoal-and-ink drawings illustrate the interiors and whose crayon drawings grace the covers. Here, Schumann explores the format of Latin American cordells, chapbooks traditionally sold by..... More
(N.p. Janus Press, 1955; 1980. Small octavo. (vi), 45, (2)pp. Inscribed twice by the author. The first book of the Janus Press, with a frontispiece woodcut and two additional cuts by Claire Van Vliet, whose imagery adopts a classical motif to echo the highbrow sentiments of Theobald's verses. A promising..... More
(London): Sotheby's Publications, (1987). Quarto. 2 volumes. 1-608; 609-1131pp., numbered continuously. Illustrated with 225 color plates and numerous black & white illustrations throughout. This detailed reference work also contains a glossary and indexes of works and authors. Hillier was the leading authority in Europe on the Japanese woodblock print, working..... More
Stuttgart, Germany: Julius Hoffmann, (1905). Small folio. (25) ff. Jewelry catalog comprised of a title leaf and 24 loose plates, enclosed in a cloth portfolio. Approximately a dozen art nouveau jewelry designs, including necklaces, rings, bracelets, and haircombs, are featured on each beautifully-detailed monotone plate. Plates printed by A. Calavas..... More
(N.p,): 1927. Pencil, colored chalk, heightened with white on buff wove paper, measuring 11 by 15 inches. Signed and dated to left of sitter's foot. Additionally dated in upper right corner "11. 4. 27". As a fine artist, Jones is perhaps best-known for his landscapes and religious iconography; early in..... More
Albuquerque: Opuscala Press, 1999. 149pp. One of 75 copies. A playful and reflective bibliography, studded with color photoreproduction collages. Bound in full black cloth with gilt titling to upper cover and spine. Fine. (2 1/2 by 2 15/16; 64x74mm). More
San Francisco: Kaldewey Press, 1980. (64)pp. Inscribed by the author/publisher Gunnar Kaldewey. A cleverly fan-shaped catalog of antiquarian fans present at the 1981 International Antiquarian Book Fair in California. Bound in white blind-embossed paper. Some wear to spine, faint foxing to outer panels, else near fine in original box and..... More
(Hammersmith: Kelmscott Press, 1897). Quarto. (xii), 340, (viii)pp. One of 250 copies on paper. With numerous initials and ornaments. Printed in Chaucer type, with chapter titles and marginal notes in red. Each of the six parts begins with a wide border and a fourteen-line initial block containing the entire first..... More
(Hammersmith): Kelmscott Press, 1894-95. Bifolium sheet printed on both sides.(4)pp. One of 250 copies. The initial full-page woodcut illustration by Edward Burne-Jones first appeared in John Ruskin's The Dream of John Ball, and depicts, with suitable romance and foreboding, Adam and Eve after their expulsion from Eden. Both clothed in..... More
Minneapolis, MN: Minnesota Center for the Book Arts, 1998. Two octavo vols. (20)pp., accordionfold; (9)pp. booklet. One of twenty-six deluxe copies, signed and lettered by the author and with custom housing by Dennis Ruud. The edition is the tenth in the MCBA's annual commissioned series, here with ten illustrations contributed..... More
California: Vernon Kilns, (c. 1938-1940). A coffee pot, featuring brown and maroon transfer-print illustration of the ship, the Pequod, from Moby Dick on a cream background. Produced by the Los Angeles-based Vernon Kilns between 1938 and 1940, this coffee pot was part of a dinnerware series inspired by Herman Melville's..... More
California: Vernon Kilns, 1938-1940. A nine-inch bowl showing an overhead view of 1930s Manhattan from the "Our America" series designed by Kent for Vernon Kilns. The piece is decorated in a lustrous cream and brown transfer print. "Our America" had the largest number of images of any series that Kent..... More
(N.p.): Kitemaug Press, 1972. A ten-leaf accordion panorama, with eight floral ornaments printed in color, one to a page. Fine in printed wrappers, housed in a paper sleeve. (3/4 by 11/16 in.; 20x18mm). More
Offenbach am Main: Klingspor, 1930. Oblong 32mo. 24pp., frenchfold. Illustrated with elegant silhouettes of men and women dressed in the height of fashion, each framed by a colorful border. Facing each silhouette or pair of silhouettes is a passage of German verse. This particular copy is specially bound as a...... More
Venice: Peter Koch, Printer, 2006. Small folio. 25ff., + 7 plates. From an edition of fifty copies, this is one of thirty bound in Venetian red stiff wrappers. Signed by the printer, Peter Koch, and photographer Robert Morgan. Produced during Koch's term as artist-in-residence at the Scuola Internazionale di Grafica..... More
(Philadelphia): Philadelpia College of Art, 1972. Quarto. (18)pp. One of eleven copies. Inscribed by the artist, Susan Kronfeld, to Stuart Schimmel, who served on the Grolier Club council and whose personal collections and public curatorial positions allowed him to continually present exhibits to the New York community. Kronfeld's eight color..... More
Chicago: Le Petit Oiseau Press, 1963. 7pp. One of 150 copies. With a portrait frontispiece of Christ tipped in. Printed by Doris V. Welsh. Some soiling to cloth at spine, else near fine in half blue cloth and yellow boards. (1 7/8 by 1 7/16; 47x36mm). More
Vancouver: Heavenly Monkey, 2018. Quarto. 63, (ii)pp. One of twenty-five copies (Series 3). With two leaves tipped in, one originating from George Wither's A Collection of Emblemes, Ancient & Moderne (London, 1635), and the other from the Nucleus Emblematum Selectissimorum of Gabriel Rollenhagen. This expansion on the leaf-book motif provides..... More
