Indian Pottery; Old and New
Santa Fe, N.M. Press at the Palace of the Governors, (2020). Baumann, Gustave. Limited Edition. Wraps. One of 145 copies, small octavo size, [28] pp. Fine. Item #23041701
Gustave Baumann (1881-1971) was a German-American printmaker and painter, one of the leading figures in the revival of colour woodcuts; he spent a great part of his life in Santa Fe, New Mexico, creating work depicting southwestern landscapes, pueblo life, and ancient Native American petroglyphs. His work has been shown in prestigious institutes such as the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art and the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.
This work, "Indian Pottery", was initially printed by the Koshare Press in 1919, in an extremely limited edition, planned to be of only fifty copies. However, only a few of those copies were ever completed; our search of OCLC locates only three institutional holdings and no auction records (RBH).
Thus, Tom Leech, at the Press at the Palace of the Governors, published this work, following the design Baumann conceived. While the 1919 publication had the block-book style text and the cuts of the pottery, Baumann had later carved brown background cuts which are printed here for the first time. This 2020 publication also scarce; as of this writing there are no copies in the online marketplace, with our search of OCLC locating twelve institutional holdings.
___DESCRIPTION: Bound in wraps of paper handmade by Thomas Leech which included Baumann's mouse-chewed canvas tool belt (too far gone to restore), New Mexico mica and recycled paper trimmings from some of Baumann's other papers, brown lettering on the front, gold endpapers, half-title block in gold, title page block a mirror of the original 1919 publication, as is the dedication and the page and a half of text, the fifteen blocks of pottery with the pots in black, the backgrounds and titles in brown; Cooper Italic type on "Baumann's remaining supply of Arak paper made by the Whitehead and Aliger Company" (per the colophon), small octavo size (8" by 6 5/8"), [28] pp., this copy no. 21 of 145 copies. Housed in a hard-cover folder covered with brown cloth, paper label on the front and lined with gold paper, made by Rosalia Galassi.
___CONDITION: Volume fine, the wraps clean and without wear, a square text block with the string binding strong, the interior is clean and bright, and entirely free of prior owner markings; clean, crisp, and as new. The folder also fine, clean with utterly without wear. Overall a lovely, as new copy.
___CITATION: For the original 1919 Koshare Press publication, see Chamberlain, "In a Modern Rendering, The Color Woodcuts of Gustave Baumann", no. 250. Chamberlain notes that there are "only a handful of completed books from a projected edition of 50".
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Price: $1,000.00