London: Vista Books, 1967 18 x 11.5cm, 48pp. Original card covers. Second edition. Anthology of poetry in which Finlay has two early poems (not concrete) here The Art Student and End of a Holiday . VG with mild wear to spine. The first edition was printed in 1963 and hence was an early Finlay contribution. VG....
Bath: Opening Press, 1967
47. 5 x 47.5 x 1.5cm, silkscreened portfolio case content of 13 individual silkscreens in various colours on thin card. The silkscreens are all concrete poems which were based on correspondence between Ian Hamilton Finlay and Eve Furnival - John Furnival's young daughter. Finlay had sent simple concrete poems to the young girl - and when he was invited to work with Furnival in the latter's class at Bath Academy these poems were created with the students (one student per print) and this portfolio produced.
There is great humour in this work - like elsewhere in Finlay's oeuvre - ambiguous headlines from real and made up newspapers give the basis for many of the works. Lobster boats here look nippy, Waterlilies lead double lives and are warned that they must reflect. hedgehogs announce annual turnovers as if they were banks or just rolled in defence.
This is one of the most rare Finlay publications. One 50 numbered copies were made. This example is internally in VG+ condition although the cover has a horrible paper scuff (although the cover is based on a childish drawing by Eve Furnival.
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London: Fulcrum Press, 1967
23 x 10cm, internally there are 2 full sheets and three sets of 6pp cards all bound one set above the other in plastic spiral binding. This artist's book has taken its design from children's books where different combinations of the inner pages can be chosen. The words in combination display a scene from a boat on canal alongside landmarks - which is a clever recreation of earlier canal stripe books where the changes in scene are over pages rather than by the reader's actions. One of 1,000 copies although 50 copies were signed and numbered.
This example is in VG+ condition.
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Dunsyre: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1967
34.5 x 17.4cm, 1pp offset lithographic price list for the Press. Mentions a long list of new publications as the Press became more prolific. By now the Press (and the Finlays had moved again and now to Dunsyre and Stoneypath Farm). Formerly folded twice else VG+.
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Brighton: Brighton Festival, 1967
13 x 19cm, printed manilla envelope content of six artist designed cards. Finlay has Star Steer and there are other works by Augusto de Campos, Eugene Gomringer, Jose Lino Gruynewald, Dom Sylvester Housedard, Gerhard Ruehm. There is also an English translation of "From Line to Constellation" by Eugen Gomringer - a manifesto of sorts from 1954.
It is worth noting that Finlay is here amongst those regarded as the giants of the visual poetry movement - a movement that became most prominent in South America but by 1963 Finlay was also producing such works and here is recognised his prominence in the British scene.
All VG in envelope that has a few marks on the back and is stamped "School of graphics Chelsea School of Art".
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Dunsyre: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1967
42.5 x 56cm, blue/green and brown silkscreen on white paper. A key to the work is bottom left with the blue/green horizontal lines being sea and the brown diagonal lines being land. Together a lattice or net is formed. Other works including unique etched glass works take up this theme of interrelationships and it is tempting to see correspondences with some of the sundial works. The Tate claims 400 of these were printed but one can never rely on those numbers as Finlay appears to have been inconsistent (it is more usually claimed he printed 350 of most items). Murray 5.11.
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Nottingham: Tarasque Press, n.d. (1967)
20.2 x 16.6cm, 32pp. Original card wrappers and a pictorial dust jacket with an image of a seascape. This artist's book (one of the few by Finlay not published by the Wild Hawthorn Press) places quotations taken from essays on phonic poetry by Ernst Jandl, Paul de Vree, and Kurt Schwitters alongside photographic images of boats (taken from the trade publication Fishing News). Importantly each boat's registration letters can be seen. As a "postscript: there is a sound poem written by Schwitters which is made up of letters very similar in combination to those of the fishing boat registrations which is the point of Finlay's book.
"The basic material is not the word but the letter." is one of the quotes chosen by Finlay to reproduce,.
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Stoneypath; Wild Hawthorne Press, 1967
26 x 21cm, 12pp. The twenty-third number of Finlay’s poetry publication - here designed by John Furnival and contributions by Max Weber, Theodore Enslin, Pierre Albert-Birot (translated by Stephen Bann),Ian Hamilton Finlay, Eli Siegel, Gael Turnbull, George Mackay Brown, Edwin Morgan, and Ronald Johnson. This number reverting to the more common collection of poems by different artists. VG+ condition. Scarce.
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Copenhague: Berg, 7 Mai 1967
21 x 15cm, 1pp. Original carbon copy of a typed and signed letter from M Berg explaining that he was to publish a novel by a young Danish writer Vagn Lundbye. The letter asks if Ramon might be able to supply a cover illustration. The title of the novel is Morkespil (Game of Shadows).
The story is of soldiers on a raft in the sea trying to survive the elements, attacks from the air and even each other. Berg says that the Ramon Mobilisation image (see elsewhere) that Boltanski sent before would do but Berg would prefer to commission new work. He then points out that there is little time so a quick response would help.
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Nottingham/Cambridge: Midland Group Gallery/Arts Council Gallery, n.d. (1967)
17.8 x 17.8cm, 12pp plus wrappers with a design by Tony Stokes. Exhibition catalogue for an early visual poetry show (even if Furnival and dsh called it "graphics and poetry". Foreword by dsh. There were works (all listed) by Ken Cox, Furnival, dsh, Hansjorg Mayer, Tom Phillips, and others as well as Finlay who contributed a large number of items.
Firstly the catalogue notes twelve different sculptural works - five of which were toys and, then, Column Poem, 4 Sails (Glass Version), fir/far in sheet metal, wave/rock (in two versions) and arc/arc in both sheet metal and perspex. There are prices - one could buy the works for between £40 and £70 - to which an annotation refers to Finlay saying "and a bargain at that".
Additionally the two large works Finlay exhibited in the Brighton Concrete Poetry show were also here - Sailor's Cross (in wood) and Purse-Net Poem (in sheet metal). Further listed in the show are various formats of Au Pair Girl (with Jon Willcocks) two of which were "perspex version 1" and "photographic version 1" and Ring of Waves with Ann Hildred, Homage with Angela Willard, Net Planet with Sue Hudson and Acrobats (letterpress - in two verstions) with Ann Stevenson. The joint work Finlay did with students from Bath College under Joh Furnival's tutorage was also displayed - Eavelines/headlines.
Looking a tthe other contributions one could easily suggest that the show was mostly Finlay.
It is perhaps worth noting that by this exhibition in 1967 Finlay had clearly entered the world of art in the sense of creating three dimensional recognisable sculptures - his first poems in the concrete format were only 3 years earlier. This is scarce publication and in VG+ condition.
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Dunsyre: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1967
58 x 43cm, pink and black silkscreen. Concrete poem - one of the earliest Finlay prints. The work is one of a number where Finlay is fascinated by the patches to be found on sails (of both boats and windmills) and also references in its title Picasso's early career portrait of a strapping naked young Dutch woman. The image suggests that one should read the symbol and the word as "Crosspatch" - which is someone easily made upset which strangely one would not take from the semi-smiling woman in the Picasso portrait. But then an unmended sail of either a windmill or a boat would cause the sails to misbehave.
The design was created from Finlay's instructions by Herbert Rosenthal. Murray 5.10
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Cambridge: Form Magazine, 1967
24 x 24cm, 32pp plus typographic wrappers. This single number from series of magazines edited by Philip Steadman, Mike Weaver and Stephen Bann - here the fourth number which contains a notes, map and a detailed review of the Brighton Concrete Poetry Exhibition to which Finlay showed two major sculptural works - Sailors' cross and Purse-Net Poem. The former was c. 1.2m high and the latter 2.4 x 1m in side - both collaboraitons with Henry Clyne.
Otherwise there are articles on the Black Mountain College, Albers 'Graphic Tectonics', 'What is Kentetism' ?, two essays by Charles Biederman, poems by Anselm Hollo. a review of Mecano magazine.
This is more of a review of Finlay's contribution to the event rather than actual works included by Finlay but we have decided to place this in the Pageworks & Contributions section of this site because of Finlay's earlier contributions to the same magazine which was after all edited by his friend and often essayist Bann who had curated much of the Brighton show. VG+ example.
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