At Bromer Booksellers, we focus on the visual book, with fine images that both enhance narrative and stand alone as independent creations. Among our holdings in this area are costume books, emblem books, examples from the Art Nouveau and Art Deco periods, the fantasy illustrators in the tradition of Arthur Rackham, and modern books with original graphics. We look for the successful fusion of picture with text from any century, any country, and across a variety of artistic movements and media. We are especially fascinated with books of other cultures, and you will occasionally find items such as Japanese illustrated woodblock books and Eskimo tales without words ...
Read more about Illustrated Books
(Paris: Perrigot-Masure, c. 1922). Framed sheet of handmade paper with a chiaroscuro watermark portrait of Dard Hunter as a young man, based on a photograph by Clara Ragna Johnson. To the left, his name is lettered in the style characteristic of the Arts and Crafts Movement. Sheets of this handmade... More
(Vienna): Jugend & Volk Wien Verlag, (1969). Oblong quarto. 210pp. One of 99 copies, signed and numbered by the artist, Wolfgang Hutter. Bound-in are three original lithographs, also signed and numbered by Hutter. An essay on the style of the Austrian neosurrealist artist, followed by a catalog of his works... More
London: Ward, Marcus & Co. (c. 1880). (8)pp., accordionfold. A New Year's card consisting of a four-panel panorama brilliantly printed in bright colors with gold backgrounds. The card allegorically depicts the year in the stages of its "life": as a child, dreaming of pudding and music-filled fun; a young man... More
(Germany: c. 1856). Charming keepsake box, holding 14 items: three handwritten notes dated 1856 and 1858, eight additional blank sheets of note paper, a colorful floral print, a religious print of an angel guiding a child by the hand, and an image on paper over cardboard of a woman with... More
London: Clover Hill Editions, 1979. Quarto. 19pp. One of 100 copies of the edition printed on Barcham Green's RWS hand-made paper, with an extra set of the engravings on japon, by Will Carter at the Rampant Lions Press. Illustrated with thirteen wood engravings by David Jones, several of which frame... More
Paris: Meynial, 1923. Small quarto. 12pp., + (12)ff. colored plates. One of 600 copies. Art Deco legend George Barbier contributed fashion plates to several albums and almanacs starting in 1912 before finally, in 1922, starting his own publication titled Falbalas et Fanfreluches. Each annual issue included an almanac for the... More
Offenbach am Main: Gebr. 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... More
Paris: Libraire Henri LeClerc, 1907-1914. Six volumes (Première Partie Tomes I-III, Seconde Partie Tomes I-II, Troisième Partie). Variously paginated. First edition. One of 300 copies. Extensively illustrated with reproductions of 2,000 woodcuts. A monumental and exhaustive bibliography on the illustrated book in Venice from 1450-1525. Essling provides lengthy and thorough... More
Boulogne-sur-Seine: Robert Blanchet, 1973. Square octavo. Ten sheets, folded so that one leaf is shorter than the other. From an edition of 220 copies, this is one of 176 regular copies printed on vélin de Rives and signed by the author, Michel Butor, and artist/publisher, Robert Blanchet. Illustrated with eight... More
Utrecht: 1958. Quarto. 45, (iii)pp. One of 175 numbered copies. With six black-and-white engravings, with an extra suite of the engravings in sanguine secured by a cloth band on the inside back cover. Maurits Cornelius Escher (1898-1972) was a Dutch graphic artist who challenged the bounds of printmaking. His prints... More
Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott Company, 1898. Small quarto. (55)pp. Eight woodcut illustrations and each page with black floral borders. A fine rendering of John Keats's poem adapted from Boccacio's Decameron. In it, a young woman engaged to marry a nobleman falls in love with a commoner. When her brothers discover... More
London: John and Arthur Arch, 1816. Small quarto. Two volumes. xxii, 478, 478*pp. + (9)ff. plates; (479)-836pp. + (13)ff. plates. A valuable reference on the history of engraving in Europe, illustrated with numerous examples throughout the text and on inserted plates. Handsomely bound in full red straight-grain morocco, decorated with... More
NY: Limited Editions Club, 1934. Quarto. 117pp. One of 1,500 copies on French Rives and signed by Picasso. Illustrated with six original etchings in black, one of which is signed in the plate and dated in reverse, and thirty lithographs printed in sanguine after drawings. This is the only American... More
London: John Murray, (1957). Oblong quarto. 76pp. Publisher's copy of the first edition. An instructional book on the creation of patterns, illustrated throughout with examples of two-, three-, and four-color patterns. The patterns themselves range from natural forms, such as flowers and insects, to geometric designs. Each page of the... More
c. 1964. Four sheets, three of which measure 8.5 by 11 inches; the single sheet of text is smaller, measuring 8 by 6 inches, and is on blue paper. These reveal the unfolding of Gorey's creative process in developing the story and preliminary illustrations for the book. The text page... More
Venice: Heironymous Scotus, 1550-1551. Quarto. 75ff. Woodcut device on title page and last leaf, several geometrical text figures, two ten-line and two five-line initial capitals. A book of commentary by the sixth-century Greek philosopher Philoponus, who also went by the name John the Grammarian for his scholarship on language. Although... More
(c. 2009). Quarto. Eight-panel, life-sized self-portrait of fiber artist Sheryl Jaffe. Numbered "1/1" and signed by Jaffe to the interior of the box. In this "sculptural artist book," Jaffe is drawn lying on her back, nude, against a background of earthy greens, sunny yellows, and liquid blues. Climbing over the... More
(Japan: Sûzan Shobô, 1816). Small quarto. (19)ff. A Japanese book of color woodblock prints by Kameda Bôsai (1754-1826), one of the leading painters of the Nanga or Bunjinga (literati) schools of painting. The seventeen full-page illustrations, five of which extend across the page spread, are landscapes depicting mountainous terrain, comprised... More
(Japan: c. mid-nineteenth century). Small quarto. (27)ff. A handmade book of delicate Japanese brush paintings of common birds, ranging from sparrows and songbirds to ducks and other fowl. The paintings are executed in a style similar to sumi-e. They are predominantly monochromatic with subtle gradations of black ink, accented with... More
Sydney, Australia: Beacon Press, 1948. Folio. 53pp. One of forty deluxe copies, signed by the author. A lovely production, illustrated with thirty-six color plates. The plates are genuine prints: beautifully made modern reproductions of the originals, done in Japan. The text traces the rise and fall of the Ukiyo-ye school... More
Kyoto: Geisodo Yamada Naosaburo, 1911. Small folio. Folding album consisting of twelve ink wash and color prints on thirteen sheets, each bearing Seiho's chop mark. One of the key figures of modern Japanese painting, Seiho (1864 - 1942) absorbed elements of European-style painting -- Impressionism, in particular -- and successfully... More
Tokyo: Kodansha International, (1977). Quarto. 264pp. Illustrated throughout in color and black & white. An introductory reference book of Japanese printing up to 1868, with a glossary and an index of the most important artists and works. Fine in quarter yellow and blue cloth, with title in silver to spine... 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
NY: Weatherhill, (1995). Square small quarto. X, 314pp. Illustrated throughout in black & white and color. Includes essays by Bruce Brooks Pfeiffer, Joan B. Mirviss, and John T. Carpenter, as well as an illustrated listing of the collection and an index of poets. Very find in blind-stamped brick cloth, with... More
Tokyo: Kodansha International, (1966). Folio. 274pp. Illustrated with 107 tipped-in color plates. A beautiful reference work tracing the Japanese print from the fifteenth century all the way through the ukiyo-e period into the nineteenth century. Adapted into English by C. H. Mitchell. Fine in black cloth, with fine dust wrapper... More
