paul robertson, Author at Unoriginal Sins

05 Jun AN URN FOR NOVALIS. 1997.

Posted at 18:23h in Artist's Postcards

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1997
20 x 13.8cm, 2pp artist's card with a drawing (elevations and plan) by Peter Coates of the sides of a memorial urn.

Novalis was the pseudonym of Friedrich von Hardenberg a German Romantic poet - the urn has on one side the name Sophie who was the poet's young love (13 when they met!) but who died not long after before she was 16. The other side of the urn has the abbreviated Greek name for Christ in some emotional sense equating the dead girl to the godhead. The top of the urn has a stylised eternal flame. VG+.

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02 Jun ALMOST HALF HER LENGTH AGAIN….. 1997.

Posted at 14:47h in Artist's Postcards

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, n.d. (1997)
15.4 x 10cm, 4pp folding card with a wraparound b/w images by Dianne Tammes of two of Finlay's toy boats. Internally there is a poem:

Almost half her length again/extending mizzen sail & jib, the/glamour of two birch dowels/breasting waves.

VG+. ...

30 May PENTIMENTI. 1997.

Posted at 09:10h in EPHEMERA

Bologna: Segreteria Galleria d'Arte, 1997 21 x 9cm, 4pp announcement card for a solo show in Italy. One installation of tin boxes reproduced on the front, internally gallery details. VG+. ...

23 May HOMAGE TO DOM SILVESTER HOUEDARD. 1997.

Posted at 09:30h in David Bellingham

Glasgow: WAX336, 1997
10 x 11cm, 2pp. Artist's card with the text "typewriter" and "Scaffolding" repeated alternatively on the front. A reference to the typescripts of dsh. Early concrete poem by Bellingham. VG+.

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19 May FOR THE NEOCONCEPTUALIST LAWRENCE WEINER IS A PRESOCRATIC. 1997.

Posted at 11:12h in David Bellingham

Glasgow: Wax366, 1997
10.5 x 15cm, 2pp artist postcard with the text which amusingly compares the conceptual artist Weiner to a Pre-Socratic . VG+.

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10 May LES REGISTRES DU GRAND-HORNU (DETAIL). 1997.

Posted at 11:00h in EPHEMERA

N.p. (Bruxelles?): COmmunaute francaise de Belgique, 1997
15 x 10.5cm, 2pp. Full colour postcard with a details from the huge title installation. Fine.

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26 Apr IAN HAMILTON FINLAY. SAIL WHOLEMEAL. PRINTS 1963 – 1997. 1997

Posted at 21:15h in Exhibition & Other Posters

Dortmund: Museum am Ostwall, 1997 98 x 60cm, full colour offset lithographic exhibition poster with a reproduction of the extremely rare Sail Wholemeal silkcreen by Finlay. An exhibition of prints from Little Sparta. VG+.

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25 Apr IMAGINED LANDS: POSTAGE STAMPS FOR A SCOTTISH REPUBLIC. 1997. WITH ORIGINAL TIPPED ON LIMITED EDITION STAMP.

Posted at 17:02h in Invitation Cards

Edinburgh: Morning Star Press/City Art centre, 1997
15 x 10.5cm, 2pp announcement card for the release of a "stamp" album released as part of an exhibition "Imagined Lands: Postage Stamps for a Scottish Republic". On the front of the card is a tipped on original cinderella stamp designed by Finlay. The stamps themselves were a limited edition. This is a very scarce card. VG+.

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13 Apr LEMONS WITHOUT BITTERNESS. 1997.

Posted at 16:39h in Artist's Postcards

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1997
17.6 x 20.5cm, 4pp. A drawing by Jo Hincks of a fifie boat: East coast herring boats. Inside Finlay has a poem:

Lemons without bitterness. Diamonds
without riches. Tabernacles without
ministers. Trees without song.

Fifies

Lemons are the boats, diamonds the fish which sparkle, tabernacles being the shelter below deck and trees being the masts - simple metaphors for the fishing vessels. VG+.

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09 Apr PAINTING BY NUMBERS. 1997.

Posted at 18:37h in Artist's Books

LittleSparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, n.d. (1997) 14.4 x 10.8 cm, 40pp plus blue printed boards. Artist's book which is dedicated to the works of Christipher Wood who painted mostly landscapes and harbour scenes. The pages herein have different boat numbers which could be associated with a particular painting the name of which Finlay appends below. One work by Wood reproduced in colour and tipped on as frontispiece. VG+....

02 Apr GEE DEES. 1997.

Posted at 14:51h in Artist's Postcards

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, n.d. (1997) 10 x 13.9cm, 4pp. Artist's postcard with two black and white photographs of a well known Edinburgh toy shop (on Lothian Road) and internally a text:

Atlantis, Xanadu, The Herspirides, Tar-na-nOg, Arcadia.
Gee Dees

The various places are all fictional and the Gee Dees are a well known model company - objects that are also fictional reflections of the original item. VG+. ...

28 Mar KEILKRAFT PROPELLERS. 1997.

Posted at 09:55h in Prints + Posters

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1997
30.5 x 28cm, offset lithograph printed brown and black on cream paper. The linocut image by Gary Hincks is of three mugs and a (sugar) bowl which has three small boat propellors in it much like flowers might be put in the absence of a vase. The work is inspired by a Ben Nicholson painting - Three Mugs and a Bowl - the same outline of the crockery is used by Hincks but the propellors are not there in the original.
Keilkraft Propellers are toy accessories used in model making so it is plausible that they might be left in a cup as storage in a strange still life but the positioning of the three propeller blades here suggest they are meant to propel the three coffee cups in some way. The coffee cups therefore become boats and the drawing a seascape.

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