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Monthly Archives: July 2016

Looking forward to — Book Arts Program workshop, “The Practice of Ukiyo-e Woodblock”

28 Thursday Jul 2016

Posted by rarebooks in Recommended Workshop

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barrens, Book Arts Studio, brayers, brushes, calligraphy, Cleveland Museum of Art, Connecticut, copperplate engravings, Daniel Kelm, Fogg Museum, Francis Willughby, Franklin Nichols Woodworking, Gerald Lange, handmade, Harvard University, Henryk Goreski, ink, J. Willard Marriott Library, Japan, Japan Foundation, Japanese paper, John Wareham, Keiichiro Uesugi, Keiji Shinohara, kozo paper, Krystyna Carter, Kyoto, Library of Congress, Middleton, Milwaukee Art Museum, Osaka, pallet knives, Paul Shaw, poetry, Polish, polymer plates, presses, printing, printmaker, rag papers, Robin Price, triptych, Ukiyo-e, United States, University of California, Wesleyan University, William Everson, woodblock, woodcut

The Practice of Ukiyo-e Woodblock
Keiji Shinohara, instructor

August 5-6
Friday & Saturday, 10:00-6:00
Book Arts Studio, J. Willard Marriott Library, Level 4
Registration for this workshop is closed.

Leave the brayers, pallet knives, rag papers, and presses behind, and journey eastward. With brushes and barrens, master printmaker Keiji Shinohara guides participants gently through the traditional Ukiyo-e technique of woodblock printing on Japanese papers. As new practitioners, participants have time to carve small, simple blocks using one or two colors. The focus of the workshop is on observance and practice of process rather than on a producing a masterful print.
– – – – –
Keiji Shinohara was born and raised in Osaka, Japan. After 10 years as an apprentice to the renowned Keiichiro Uesugi in Kyoto, he became a Master Printmaker and moved to the United States. Shinohara’s nature-based abstractions are printed on handmade kozo paper using water-based pigment onto woodblocks in the ukiyo-e style–the traditional Japanese printmaking method dating to 600 CE. Though Shinohara employs ancient methods in creating his woodblock prints, he also diverges from tradition by experimenting with ink application and different materials to add texture to his prints. He is currently teaching printmaking at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut and has been a visiting artist at over 100 venues and 30 solo shows. He has received grants from the Japan Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts and his work is in many public collections, including the Cleveland Museum of Art, the Fogg Art Museum at Harvard University, Milwaukee Art Museum, and the Library of Congress.

Rare Books is pleased to support the Book Arts Program with its collections.

N7433.98-A48-1996

Altar Book of Gorecki
Middleton, CT: Robin Price, Publisher, 1996

Inspired by a 1992 recording of Henryk Goreski’s Symphony No. 3. English translation by Krystyna Carter. Calligraphy of Polish lyrics by Paul Shaw. Bird illustrations are from seventeenth-century copperplate engravings by Francis Willughby. Photographed by John Wareham, the illustrations were digitally adapted and made into polymer plates by Gerald Lange. Woodcut designed and carved by Keiji Shinowara. Triptych structure with the consultation of Daniel Kelm. Box design and construction by Franklin Nichols Woodworking. Designed, printed and bound by Robin Price. Edition of sixty copies.

PS3509-V65-R38-1998-Bird-Spread

PS3509-V65-R38-1998-Socket-Of-Consequence

Ravaged With Joy
William Everson (1912-1994)
Middletown, CT: R. Price, 1998
PS3509 V65 R38 1998

A record of the poetry reading at the University of California, Davis, on May 16, 1975. Woodcuts by Keiji Shinohara. Issued in slipcase. Edition of one hundred and fifty copies, signed by the artist. University of Utah copy is no. 62.

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We recommend — Evolution and Imagination in Victorian Children’s Literature

27 Wednesday Jul 2016

Posted by rarebooks in Recommended Reading

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Alice's Adventures in Wonderand, animals, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, Charles Darwin, Charles Kingsley, children, children's literature, elementary education, English, evolution, Francis Hodgson Burnett, Jessica Straley, Lewis Carroll, Margaret Gatty, On the Origin of Species, Rare Books Department, Rudyard Kipling, species, The University of Utah, Victorian, vivisection

Dustjacket

Evolution and Imagination in Victorian Children’s Literature
Jessica Straley
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016

From the publisher: “Evolutionary theory sparked numerous speculations about human development, and one of the most ardently embraced was the idea that children are animals recapitulating the ascent of the species. After Darwin’s Origin of Species, scientific, pedagogical, and literary works featuring beastly babes and wild children interrogated how our ancestors evolved and what children must do in order to repeat this course to humanity. Exploring fictions by Rudyard Kipling, Lewis Carroll, Frances Hodgson, Burnett, Charles Kingsley, and Margaret Gatty, Jessica Straley argues that Victorian children’s literature not only adopted this new taxonomy of the animal child, but also suggested ways to complete the child’s evolution. In the midst of debates about elementary education and the rising dominance of the sciences, children’s authors plotted miniaturized evolutions for their protagonists and readers and, more pointedly, proposed that the decisive evolutionary leap for both our ancestors and ourselves is the advent of the literary imagination.

Jessica Straley is Assistant Professor of English at the University of Utah. She has published articles on evolutionary theory, vivisection, and Victorian literature in Victorian Studies and Nineteenth-Century Literature and has contributed a chapter to Drawing on the Victorian: The Palimsest of Victorian and Non-Victorian Graphic Texts, edited by Anna Maria Jones and Rebecca N. Mitchell.”

The Rare Books Department is pleased to have contributed images to this book from its copy of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll (1865).

Straley, Evolution, p. 96
Straley, Evolution, p. 103
Straley, Evolution, p. 104

Straley, Evolution, p. 112-113

Congratulations, Professor Straley!

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Book of the Week — The Democratic Book

25 Monday Jul 2016

Posted by rarebooks in Book of the Week

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administration, attorney, banking, Bay Area, book, cabinet, California Zephyr, Chicago, Constitution, convention, Democrat, democratic, Denver & Rio Grande Western Railroad, election, endpapers, first lady, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, funeral, Geneva Steel, gilt, Herbert Hoover, judge, morocco, platform, President, railroad, Reconstruction Finance Corporation, Republican, Rio Grande, San Francisco, silk, The Democratic National Convention, Third District Court, train, Utah, vista-dome cars, Wilson McCarthy

JK2313-1936-D38-frontisJK2313-1936-D38-signature

“Better the occasional faults of a government that lives in a spirit of charity than the consistent omissions of a government frozen in the ice of its own indifference.” — Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 1936

THE DEMOCRATIC BOOK, 1936
Philadelphia?, 1936?
JK2313 1936 D38 oversize

This book was given to delegates at the 1936 Democratic convention, held that year in Philadelphia. It contains information such as the party’s platform, election results, and statements from the President, his cabinet members, other important members of his administration, and the first lady.

This copy belonged to Wilson McCarthy (1884-1956), a judge who sat on Utah’s Third District Court in 1919. He left the bench a year later and earned a fortune as a private practice attorney. In 1926 he was elected to the Utah state senate. A lifelong Democrat, he was appointed by Republican President Herbert Hoover to the Reconstruction Finance Corporation in 1932. A year later, he began a career in banking in San Francisco. In 1934, the RFC asked him to take control of the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad, which had just defaulted on a $10 million loan. It took McCarthy and others nearly two decades to rehabilitate the company. In 1937 alone, $18 million was pumped into the property.

Under McCarthy’s administration the Rio Grande built more than 1100 bridges and laid more than two million railroad ties. By the end of World War II, the railroad’s revenues had increased from $17 million to $75 million per year. During this time, McCarthy anchored the Rio Grande between Salt Lake City (his birthplace) and Denver. Freight time between these two points dropped from 54 hours to just under 24 hours. McCarthy, in conjunction with the Western Pacific Railroad began the “California Zephyr,” a luxury service between Chicago and the Bay Area. He also added the train’s signature vista-dome cars.

In addition to his turn-around of the fortunes of the railroad, McCarthy helped bring Geneva Steel to Utah. On the day of his funeral, every Rio Grande train stopped, their crews observing two minutes of silence.

This book was also published, with some variations, under the title The Democratic National Convention, 1936. The book contains dozens of contemporary advertisements, many in color. Illustrated with nineteen full-page portraits and dozens of in-text half-tones and illustrations, and a facsimile of the Constitution. Bound in full brown morocco gilt, watered silk endpapers, top edge gilt. Limited edition of unknown quantity. University of Utah copy is no. 1464, stamped in gilt “Wilson McCarthy” and signed by Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Gift of Wilson McCarthy.

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On Jon’s Desk: A gift from Ed Firmage raises questions

24 Sunday Jul 2016

Posted by rarebooks in On Jon's Desk

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Brigham Young, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Ed Firmage, Edward W. Tullidge, Eliza R. Snow, George Henry Snell, Godbeite Movement, H. R. Hall & Sons, John Shaffer, John Taylor, Jon Bingham, Kenneth Brailsford, Kingdom of God, Life of Brigham Young; or, Linda Brailsford, Millenial Star, Mormon, pioneers, railroad, Saltair Beach Resort, Slat Lake Valley, Utah, Utah and Her Founders, Utah Central Railroad, Utah Soap Company

front board

front board

title page

title page

Title: Life of Brigham Young; or, Utah and Her Founders
Author: Edward W. Tullidge
Published: New York, (s.n.), 1876

Pages: 458 with 81 additional pages comprising a supplement containing biographical sketches of other prominent Utah leaders (Contains Errata slip: “Biographical sketches of the late Willard Richards, Joseph A. Young, and others, not received by the printer in time for this issue will be inserted in subsequent editions.”)

Bound in ornamental gilt stamped purple cloth. Blind stamped borders; blind stamped title on rear cover; coated end papers.

Signed, presentation copy: “Presented to G. Henry Snell by Brigham Young [signed], Salt Lake City, U.T., October 16th, 1876”

inscription

inscription

Includes an engraving of Brigham Young by H.R. Hall & Sons (of New York)

Brigham Young portrait

Brigham Young portrait

A gift from Ed Firmage (University of Utah Professor Emeritus) to the Rare Books Department raises intriguing questions. In the front of this well preserved copy of the Life of Brigham Young; or, Utah and Her Founders, published in 1876, is a calligraphic inscription wherein Brigham Young presents this copy to G. Henry Snell. According to an obituary, George Henry Snell was a successful business man in the Salt Lake City area during the latter half of the 19th century. Born in St. Louis, he moved to the Salt Lake Valley as a young child. Mr. Snell operated the Utah Soap Company and was one of the original stockholders in the Saltair Beach Resort. He suffered from a heart condition that resulted in an early death at fifty years of age. What is not known is the nature of the relationship between Henry Snell and Brigham Young, the then President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and, as the memoir shows, one of the most powerful men in the American West at the time.

Written by Edward W. Tullidge, this biography of Brigham Young includes memoirs concerning many of the prominent early LDS church leaders in Utah. Despite evidence Brigham Young was not opposed to this biography (the fact that he presented copies as gifts, as seen above), Tullidge was not sanctioned by the LDS church to write it. The author himself tells us his reasons for undertaking the work in the preface:

“That the matters embodied in the chapters of this book are eminently worthy an enduring record will, I think, be cheerfully conceded. Of myself let me say, if the manner in which I have handled the subject betrays my love for the Mormon people, I confess it. But it must not be forgotten that I have been, for many years, an apostate, and cannot be justly charged with a spirit of Mormon propagandism. Rather have I striven to treat the subject with an artist’s fidelity, and with the earnestness of one concerned.”

So we see that Edward Tullidge wrote his account because of his love for the Mormon people and believed the events of the time period covered in his book were “worthy an enduring record.” But he also divulged he was an apostate, or one who had left the church.

Born in England in 1829 and having been introduced to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints there in the 1840’s, Edward Tullidge immigrated to the Salt Lake valley in the early 1860’s where he became a literary critic, newspaper editor, playwright, and historian. He wrote numerous journal articles, several plays, and five books (including the Life of Brigham Young). Although still technically a member of the LDS Church at the time of writing the biography (despite the claim of being apostate in the preface), Tullidge participated in the Godbeite movement (which initially sought to reform the church by breaking Brigham Young’s hold on secular and economic matters) and then in the late 1870’s joined the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Some LDS church leaders did not approve of the biography Tullidge wrote about Brigham Young. There is evidence of this in an article published in the Millenial Star in November of 1878. The article relates an interview between President John Taylor and Edward Tullidge concerning his publishing of Life of Brigham Young and his interest in writing a biography on Joseph Smith. During the interview President Taylor inquired about the statement in the biography’s preface concerning him being an apostate and forbade Tullidge from having access to the church’s Historian’s Office.

Millenial Star

Millenial Star

Life of Brigham Young is a historical treatise dealing primarily with the socio-political developments of the Latter-day Saints from their arrival in the Salt Lake valley in the late 1840’s to the mid 1870’s when the book was published. At publication Brigham Young was seventy-five years old and still the leader of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, but the book shows many ways in which the federal government and dissidents in the Salt Lake valley had drawn secular power away from him over the previous two decades (1850’s – 1860’s). Tullidge showcased the deep cultural issues of the time with passages such as (page 366-367):

“Governor Shaffer arrived in Utah in the latter end of March, 1870. Casting about for some object on which to expand his belligerency, he made enquiry of a prominent schismatic as to the feasibility of successfully attacking polygamy. The answer was: ‘I married my wives in good faith. They married me in good faith. They have borne me children. We have lived together for years, believing it was the will of God. The same is true of the Mormon people generally. Before I will abandon my wives as concubines, and cast off my children as bastards, I will fight the United States Government down to my boots. What would you do, Governor, in the like case?’

‘By —, I would do the same!’ [the Governor replied.]”

Tullidge also wrote of significant historical events that came to fruition under Brigham Young’s leadership such as (page 362-363):

“The next important event in the history of Utah was the laying of the last rail of the Utah Central Railroad. The completion of the Union and Central Pacific lines was a national event, affecting greatly the destiny of Utah as well as that of the entire Pacific coast; but the completion of the Utah Central was the proper local sign of radical changes. …

It was January 10th, 1870; the weather was cold; a heavy fog hung over the city of the Great Salt Lake; but the multitude assembled, and by two o’clock P.M. there is said to have been gathered around the depot block not less than fifteen thousand people. … A large steel mallet had been prepared for the occasion, made at the blacksmith’s shop of the public works of the Church. The last ‘spike’ was forged of Utah iron, … The mallet was elegantly chased, bearing on the top an engraved bee-hive (the emblem of the State of Deseret), surrounded by the inscription ‘Holiness to the Lord,’ and underneath the bee-hive were the letters U.C.R.R.; a similar ornament consecrated the spike, both intending to symbolize that Utah, with the railroad, should still be the ‘Kingdom of God.’ … The honor of driving the last spike in the first railroad built by the Mormon people, was assigned to President Young.”

The Life of Brigham Young provides a dual perspective of an important time in Utah’s history from an author who loved the Mormon people yet disagreed with some of the policies of the prominent leaders he wrote about. This perspective adds value to the historical record of the two decades following the settling of the Salt Lake Valley by the early Mormon pioneers.

Questions that the Rare Books staff will continue to research include the number of copies printed and how many of those Brigham Young gave (with the front inscription) to others. We know of one other inscribed copy (given to Eliza R. Snow, wife of Brigham Young), which is in the Kenneth and Linda Brailsford manuscript collection (Accn 2935).

Contributed by Jon Bingham, Rare Books Curator

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Rare Books Exhibition — Love Letters: A Gallery of Type

21 Thursday Jul 2016

Posted by rarebooks in Physical Exhibitions

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American, book design, book designers, Bruce Rogers, Johan Gutenberg, Marriott Library, movable type, Pablo Neruda (1904-1973), printers, printing, rare books, type, typographers, typography

Posterfinal(jpegforblog)

Love Letters: A Gallery of Type

Love Letters celebrates type, typographers, and printers – from Johann Gutenberg (c.1398-1468), who developed printing with movable type, to Bruce Rogers (1870-1957), an American typographer and book designer. Type is designed to be both functional and evocative. Type has personality, flair, and style, inspired by time and place. It can age quickly or become classic. Good type grabs our attention. Great type keeps our attention.

On display are books and printed ephemera, dating from 1482 to the first decade of the 21st century, from the J. Willard Marriott’s rare book collections – examples of the development of typography and printing and why we love type.

July 22, 2016 — September 30, 2016
Marriott Library, Levels 1, 4, & 5

This exhibition is free and open to the public.

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Book of the week — The Next Word: Red Square

18 Monday Jul 2016

Posted by rarebooks in Book of the Week

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Alan Loney, Albion press, Arthur C. Danto, Australia, Barcham Green India Office, Bill Stewart, Dante, Dutch, Electio Editions, English, Groningen, Harvard University Press, Hendrik Werkman, Holland, letterpress, Lewis Allen, Malvern East, philosopher, printer, Ruscombe India Office, typography, University of Utah, Vamp & Tramp, wood type

PR9639.3-L6-N49-2012-(cover)

THE NEXT WORD: RED SQUARE
Alan Loney (b. 1940)
Malvern East VIC, Australia: Electio Editions, 2012
PR9639.3 L6 N49 2012

From the artist’s statement: “This book derives from putting two small obsessions together and seeing what happens. The first is with the typographical wonder of Hendrik Werkman (1882-1945), and his remarkable periodical ‘The Next Call,’ printed from 1923 to 1926. Each issue was 8 pages long, in approximately 40 copies, and designed and printed entirely from the materials of his print shop in Groningen, Holland…

My second obsession is the imaginary exhibition outlined by Arthur C Danto in his now famous book The Transfiguration of the Commonplace (Harvard University Press, 1981) where he poses the thorny set of intellectual problems around the question of the wording one attaches to paintings. Simply, Danto’s exhibition was a series of red rectangles, all looking the same, but all painted by different artists, and each with a different title. This apparently simple proposition created for Danto one of the knottiest philosophical speculations in contemporary criticism.

My book is designed to honor both these men, the material printer who said, ‘I produce designs during the course of printing,’ and the intellectual who wrote, “I am speaking as a philosopher, construing the gesture as a philosophical act.’ The pages for the ‘exhibition’ appear on the rectos only. The texts on the versos are constructed solely from all the Dutch words that in their spelling are also English words in Werkman’s texts through out the nine issues of ‘The Next Call.’”

Designed, printed, and bound by Alan Loney. Letterpress printed with Dante and wood types in red, blue, yellow, and gold on vintage Barcham Green India Office or Ruscombe India Office paper using a copy of Lewis Allen’s Albion press.* Bound with Ruscombe paper over boards. Issued in slipcase. Edition of forty-five copies, numbered, five copies hors de commerce. University of Utah copy is number 36, signed by the author.

*Thanks to Bill Stewart, Vamp & Tramp, for his knowledge, friendship and inspiration.

PR9639.3-L6-N49-2012-titlePR9639.3-L6-N49-2012-warspread

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Book of the week — Biblia sacra

11 Monday Jul 2016

Posted by rarebooks in Book of the Week

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Apostles, Bible, brass clasps, classical scholar, decorative headbands, engravings, Exodus, France, Franciscus Stephanus, François Estienne, François Perrin, French, Geneva, Geneva Bible, Greek, Henri Estienne, horseback, initials, John Calvin, Kings, Latin, linguist, Lyon, maps, Margaret Cave, New Testament, Normandy, Paris, Petrum Santandreanum, Pierre Saint-André, pigskin, printer, Protestant, Robert Estienne, roll-tooled, Tabernacle, tail pieces, University of Utah, woodcuts

Biblia-Sacra-title

BIBLIA SACRA VETERIS ET NOUI TESTAMENTI…
Geneuae: Apud Petrum Santandreanum, MDLXXXIII. 1583
BS75 1583

A reissue, with a different title page, of an edition of François Estienne, Geneva, 1567. The title page of the New Testament bears the imprint: Ex Officina Francisci Stephanii, 1567. This edition was printed by Pierre Saint-André (1555-1624).

François Estienne was the third son of Robert Estienne (1503-1559), a French printer, linguist and classical scholar. In his father’s footsteps, François left France for Geneva as a follower of the Protestant movement. He was active as a printer between 1562 and 1582 in partnership with François Perrin, an associate of John Calvin. François Estienne issued a number of editions of the Bible in Latin and French, as well as works by Calvin. Some scholars believe that François emigrated to Normandy in 1582, where he married Margaret Cave. They had several children, none of whom survived to adulthood.

Robert Estienne’s fourth edition (1551) of the Bible is notable for being the first Latin Bible to be printed with verse numeration. Estienne designed the divisions to help the reader compare the two Latin translations and the Greek translation found in this edition. The fourth edition became the basis for the Geneva Bible. Estienne’s son Henri wrote that his father numbered the divisions while traveling “inter equitandum” from Paris to Lyon. Questionable verse divisions were later ascribed to the jolting of a ride on horseback. Although it is unlikely that Estienne was working while riding, the divisions appear to be hasty and distracted, a situation we can well imagine if Estienne was working on this project while traveling.

Text in double columns, with references, variants and section letters in the margins. Illustrated with two engraved folding maps, one in the New Old Testament and one in the New Testament; two full-page engraved maps; woodcuts of the Tabernacle and other images in Exodus and Kings, with occasional figures elsewhere; decorative headbands, tail-pieces and initial letters. The title-page for the New Testament has the woodcut device of Franciscus Stephanus. University of Utah copy bound in contemporary pigskin over wooden boards, covers with roll-tooled decoration, featuring portraits of the Apostles; brass clasps and catches; old paper spine labels.

Bibla-Sacra-EgyptMap

Bibla-Sacra-Mediterraneanseamap

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Book of the week — Night feet on earth

05 Tuesday Jul 2016

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Bayeaux Tapestry, comets, conjunctions, firmament, grid, Halley's Comet, handcut zinc blocks, hooves, horse, Ken Campbell, letterpress, linguist, Oxford, pagan, poem, poetry, stars, woodletter, zinc, zinc plate

N7433.4-C36-N44-1987-titleN7433.4-C36-N44-1987-spread2

“Where the hooves touch the ground.”

NIGHT FEET ON EARTH
Ken Campbell
London, England: Ken Campbell, 1986
N7433.4 C36 N44 1987

Artist’s statement: “The recent visitation by Halley’s Comet, and its image upon the Bayeux Tapestry, brought forth a poem about comets and a divine child descending:; a rather pagan Christmas Carol. The poem is set in airily spaced woodletter capitals, and is alternately revealed either in white space or on a dark, starry backdrop. A comet appears. Its form is gained from the back leg and tail of a dark horse that moves about the printed firmament. The horse is sometimes dismembered, and sometimes whole. At a Christmas dinner in Oxford I found a party cracker on the table and opened it and found, along with the necessarily silly paper hat, a little plastic thing like an articulated hat rack. It was a horse that you could open and shut. I asked a lady to my right what it was that she did. After no little thought she replied, ‘My husband is a linguist.’ I thought, ‘I’m going to do a book about these bizarre conjunctions.’ Halley’s Comet, the horse, and this poem in my mind: that is the poem of the book. I cut out a zinc horse in its different attitudes, opened and shut, and moved it around a firmament of stars. The stars were holes drilled at regular grid intervals in a solid zinc plate that was to supply the blue black night sky. The text is given in very few words for each page. At the end of many pages I show the first word of the next page at the foot of the text to give rhythm and to echo the tradition of cueing the eye for what is to come overleaf. Set in capitals about an inch high, the poetry runs from one left had page to the following left hand page. On the right hand side is a big blue firmament of graded colour with yellow printed underneath to give a little light to the dark horizon. Sometimes the stars are white and sometimes yellow, to give a very mechanical but velvety rendition of the sky in regularly spaced stars. Over this disports a horse in black a metaphor for the comet; a metaphor for the divine child descending. In the first half of the book the first half of the poem is shown on the white, left hand page while the second half of poem is pursued in the dark right. After a central spread where the parts of the horse are wildly rodeo-ed around the firmament, the process is reversed and the first half of the poem is pursued in the dark, left hand page, while the second half of the poem is revealed in the now white, right hand pages. On the slipcase and the closing page the horse’s tail has been distorted to give a fiery tail of a comet. This book is where the hooves touch the ground.”

Letterpress printed in four colors from woodletter and handcut zinc blocks. Issued in slipcase. Edition of fifty copies.

N7433.4-C36-N44-1987-spread

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Boom!

04 Monday Jul 2016

Posted by rarebooks in Uncategorized

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American, Benjamin Franklin, Bill of Rights, Boston, Boston Gazette, Boston Massacre, British, colonial, colonies, David Hume, Dunlap, Edmund Burke, England, Great Britain, independence, John Adams, John Wesley, Josiah Quincy, London, monarchy, pamphlet, Philadelphia, Richard Price, Stamp Act, tuberculosis, William Pitt

“…that sacred blessing of Liberty, without which man is a beast, and government a curse”

E263-M4-Q7-1774-title

“No free government was ever founded or ever preserved its liberty without uniting the characters of the citizen and soldier in those destined for the defence of the state…such are a well-regulated militia…who take up arms to preserve their purposes, as individuals, and their rights as freemen.”

OBSERVATIONS ON THE ACT OF PARLIAMENT…
Josiah Quincy (1744-1775)
Boston, N.E., Printed for and sold by Edes and Gill, 1774
First edition

Attorney Josiah Quincy, a Boston native, wrote a series of anonymous articles for the Boston Gazette in which he opposed the Stamp Act and other British colonial policies. His evenhandedness, however, in his approach to the troubles between the American colonies and England, served him and the colonial stance well. He, along with John Adams, defended the British soldiers in their trial after the Boston Massacre. That act aside, in Observations, Quincy urged “patriots and heroes” to “form a compact for opposition…For, under God, we are determined that wheresoever, whensoever, and howsoever we shall be called to make our exit, we will die free men.” In the same year as this publication, Quincy went to England to argue the colonial cause. He died of tuberculosis on the way home in sight of land.

E211-P9625-1776-title

“Our own people, being unwilling to enlist, and the attempts to procure armies of Russians, Indians, and Canadians having miscarried; the utmost force we can employ, including foreigners…This is the force that is to conquer…determined men fighting on their own ground, within sight of their houses and families, and for that sacred blessing of Liberty, without which man is a beast, and government a curse. All history proves, that in such a situation, a handful is a match for millions.”

OBSERVATIONS ON THE NATURE OF CIVIL LIBERTY…
Richard Price (1723-1791)
London printed 1776; Philadelphia, Re-printed and sold by J. Dunlap, 1776?

Richard Price, radical in his religious and political views, was well-known in Great Britain as a writer on economic and political issues. A close friend of William Pitt, David Hume, and Benjamin Franklin, he became one of Britain’s most vocal supporters of American independence. Several thousand copies of Observations were sold within a few days. The pamphlet both extolled the rights of the American colonists and excoriated the British crown. Harshly criticized by John Wesley, Edmund Burke, and others, the controversy quickly made Price a celebrity. Price argued that governments held their power in trust from the people and were not instruments of divine authority. The monarchy of England, he said, was only legitimate because it ruled by consent of the people under England’s Bill of Rights. The revolutionaries in the American colonies were merely asserting the same principle. His pamphlet played no small part in encouraging the colonists to declare independence. In 1778 he was invited by Congress to go to America and assist in the financial administration of the states. He refused the offer, unwilling to quit his own country.

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Looking forward to Book Arts Program workshop, “All Shook Up: Text & Image in Flag Books”

01 Friday Jul 2016

Posted by rarebooks in Recommended Workshop

≈ Comments Off on Looking forward to Book Arts Program workshop, “All Shook Up: Text & Image in Flag Books”

Tags

1954, American, Anchorage Museum of History and Art, artist, artists' books, Book Arts Studio, Brooklyn Museum, Canadian Bookbinders & Artists' Guild, Center for Book Arts, Designer Bookbinders (US), digital printing, flag book structure, Florence, Florida Atlantic University, Fogg Museum of Art, Glenview, Graceland, Guild of Book Workers, Harvard University, Hedi Kyle, history, Illinois, image, Italy, J. Willard Marriott Library, jig, Karen Hanmer, Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft, Les Amis de la Reliure d'Art du Canada, Library of Congress, military, New York City, non-adhesive, photograph, Photoshop, politics, science, Tate Britain, text, UCLA, University of West England Bristol

Text & Image in Flag Books
Karen Hanmer, instructor

July 7
Thursday, 9:00–5:00
Book Arts Studio, J. Willard Marriott Library, Level 4
Application for this workshop is closed.

The foundation of Hedi Kyle’s deceptively small and simple book flag book structure is an accordion folded spine. Flaps attached to both sides of each of the spine’s mountain folds allow the artist to fragment and layer a number of complementary or contrasting images and narratives. When the flag book spine is pulled fully open, the fragmented images on the flaps come together to create a large, panoramic image. Participants experiment with complementary and contrasting text and images and discuss the effects of different spine and page dimensions, direction of motion, and which images are most successful. Students learn a tidy, non-adhesive method of covering boards and use a jig to facilitate quicker, more precise assembly. While this is not a computer class, digital printing and setting up Photoshop templates for pages, covers and spines is demonstrated.
– – – – –
Karen Hanmer’s artists’ books are physical manifestations of personal essays intertwining history, culture, politics, science and technology. She utilizes both traditional and contemporary book structures, and the work is often playful in content or format. Hanmer exhibits widely, and her work is included in collections ranging from Tate Britain and the Library of Congress to UCLA and Graceland. Solo exhibition venues include Florida Atlantic University, University of the West of England Bristol, and the Center for Book Arts (NYC). Curated exhibition venues include the Anchorage Museum of History and Art, Brooklyn Museum, Harvard University’s Fogg Museum of Art, the Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft; and traveling exhibitions sponsored by the Guild of Book Workers (US), Designer Bookbinders (UK) the Canadian Bookbinders and Book Artists’ Guild, and Les Amis de la Reliure d’Art du Canada.

Rare Books is proud to support the Book Arts Program with its collections.

N7433.4-H357-L48-2004-front N7433.4-H357-L48-2004-back

Letter Home
Karen Hanmer
Glenview, IL: K. Hanmer, 2004
N7433.4 H357 L48 2004

Hedi Kyle flag book structure. One side of each flag has text, the other side of each flag has a color image which is part of a family photograph. The family photograph becomes whole when the accordion folds are stretched and the pages fall open. Text is from a letter written from Italy in 1954 by a military wife to her relatives. Upper and lower boards are covered in reproduction of a photograph of an American woman [the artist’s mother] on a balcony overlooking Florence, Italy. Issued in an artist-made phase box of green map folder stock with fabric hook-and-loop fasteners.

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