Saturday, April 05, 2008

Antiquarian Book Fair

I meant to "pop in" to the Antiquarian Book Fair for an hour or so -- think we ended up staying nearly three hours. Tons of great artwork to see, not only in print, but originals from Sendak, Potter, Dulac, Detmold (my new favorite after today), Rackham, Shepard, Suess, and many others.

I don't think cameras were allowed so these pictures were all taken petty hastily, and it shows. Still, here are a few fuzzy highlights from the day. Some where old favorites and others are artists I have never heard of.

8 comments:

Eric Braddock said...

Thanks for posting this, some really awesome stuff! I especially like the Pyle and the Sendak.

Anonymous said...

Man that Sendak is gorgeous! Is this thing open to the public? I would love to check it out next year.

Pablo Defendini said...

That LeGuin cover is beautiful.... speaks to the ongoing debate between abstract/conceptual cover designs as opposed to more literal interpretations of the work in question.

ces said...

Wonderful! I also like the Sendak.Thanks so much!

Carl V. Anderson said...

So glad you took some sneaky pics! I could have easily lost myself for days in a place like that, let alone 3 hours.

Unknown said...

Thanks for sharing this! Really fantastic. I especialy like the Rackham who's a personal hero of mine(real original, I know...)Was that done in red ink or watercolour?

Irene Gallo said...

Kristina - It's open to anyone...and most of the dealers didn't seem to mind that fact that we were clearly window shopping. (Although, if I HAD a spare $75,000.00 in my pocket I would have gladly bought something.)

Pablo - Book design seemed so much more open minded up until the 80s...but I think it's expanding again. Fun times to be in the sf/f biz. What I find a shame is how much the thriller and general fiction categories are still fairly focused. The show exhibited so many great designs for mainstream books that would never fly today.

Eric: Never apologize for liking Rackham. Funny story: I went to Illustration House's "back porch" auction once. It's occasionally a place to get bargains. I saw a loose sketchy ink drawing - real abstract, but still woodsy. I couldn’t say why, but I fell in love with it. I thought I'd put a bid on it, thinking it probably would be overlooked by most people. Yeah, right! Of course it was a Rackham and went for many thousands of dollars.

Unknown said...

It's such a shame no one noticed it was a Rackham!
I was trying to buy the older editions of Rackham's stuff around here, but someone was one step ahead buying it all up. It turned out to be a descendant of Mr Rackham!