Mar 052018
 

“There’s nothing you can’t do
Now you’re in New York
These streets will make you feel brand new
Big lights will inspire you

Let’s hear it for New York, New York, New York…”

Among other things, we are debuting a new work by Richard Minsky, It Can’t Happen Here, as well as some new books to our occult catalog.

Additionally, we will bring our normal catalog of eccentric publications, wild ephemera, and curious esoterica including a few recent acquisitions. Among other things, we will have fine press and fine bindings, artists’ books from Latin America to New York to England, occult and witchcraft books, and sex and sexuality materials…

You can access our show list under the tab for the 2018 ABAA New York International Book Fair.

And last, but not least, if you would like a pass, let us know, email Ian or Kim

Happy biblio-hunting! See you in New York!

Jan 202018
 

Consider this a teaser, as the images do not capture just how stunning these volumes are. We are pleased to have 3 of the 5 deluxe editions (one stayed in Ireland and the other at Yale). Each of the 5 is uniquely bound in a binding reflecting issues embodied in the 1729 text, modern Ireland, and the world as a whole. We are pleased to have and to offer Abortion, Homelessness, and Religion.

If you have not seen it, the Irish Times article offers a great overview. A description of the standard and deluxe editions follows the images. I’ve also reposted some images of the standard edition and content at the very end. It is a remarkable work.

Swift, Jonathan; O’Kane, David [illus]; Carpenter, Andrew [intro]; Traynor, Jessica [poetry]. A Modest Proposal. Dublin, Ireland: The Salvage Press, 1729 [2017]. Limited Edition. Tight, bright, and unmarred. Halfbound, black leather spine and foredge, red leather spine label, gilt lettering, marbled paper boards, printed in red and black ink; matching drop-spine archival box with inlaid Irish porcelain. Imperial folio. 64pp. Illus. (b/w plates). Lettered limited edition, this being IJK. [N.B. there are 4 additional copies, i-iv, hors de commerse. Deluxe copies, 1-5, are each in a unique binding reflecting an issue confronting modern Ireland (homelessness, abortion rights, direct provision, religious persecution, and affordable housing) in “hand dyed alum tawed goatskin with reverse offset printed inlays and red calfskin borders, 22c gold hand lettered title, red handmade paper doublures with blind tooling, distressed silver endpapers with 23.5c gold leaf highlights, graphite top edge, red calfskin headbands” by Kate Holland and including an additional portfolio containing a full suite of the lithographs and a full suite of the poems. Fine in Fine Archival Box. Hardcover.

“This publishing of A Modest Proposal was produced to mark the 350th anniversary of the birth of Jonathan Swift in 1667. First printed in 1729 by Sarah Harding ‘on the Blind Key‘, Dublin.

Designed, typeset and letterpress printed by Jamie Murphy with much grateful assistance from Niamh McNally, Sarah O’Neill and Phelim McGovern. The type employed is 22 point Monotype Caslon, an interesting cut quite close in character to William Caslon’s ‘Roman and Italick’ types of the late 1720s. The type was originally cast into founts by Neil Winter at The Whittington Press from matrices acquired from the Oxford University Press. The book was printed on a Western style Double Crown proofing press at Distillers Press, NCAD, Dublin. Andrew Carpenter has introduced the edition. Jessica Traynor has supplied nine new poems in response to the original text. David O’Kane has scratched the ten illustrations which have been editioned from lithographic stones by Michael Timmins at his workshop in Stoneybatter. The book has been printed on 250gsm mouldmade paper from the Zerkall Mill, Hürtgenwald, Germany, supplied by John Purcell, London. Based in Wiltshire, UK, Jemma Lewis has designed and produced the marbled papers based on marble patterns found at St. Patrick’s Cathederal where Swift was once Dean. Eleanor Swan has produced the porcelain inserts for the standard copies at her studio on the grounds of Russborough House, Co. Wicklow.” (Publisher statement)

Sep 302017
 

We have a had a run of interesting, unusual fine press and/or artists books land recently, but this stood out and I thought I’d throw up a quick overview:

Julie Rafalski, Tahu Deans and David Henningham re-enacted Cold War psychic drawing experiments in a Leipzig building that had formerly housed an East German supercomputer. They also reconstructed the computer as a set to be reconfigured and photographed.

These pictures, films, drawings and transcripts make up the content of this book. Operating like the distinct CMYK dots that merge optically to form a full-colour picture, the artists have worked together to take the viewer through corridor spaces, doctored photographs, and a psychic spying apparatus redolent of the building itself. Not every page is accessible without the use of a knife.

And because gilding the lily is always a good thing…

The books are editioned using a vector-based system so that each book is assigned a non-hierarchical relationship to the others.

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