15 Feb

Posted at 15:44h in Artist's Books

Dunsyre, : Wild Hawthorn Press, (1982)
7.5 x 9.5cm, 12pp plus card wrappers and printed pink dust jacket.
Artist's book with two drawings by Ian Gardner - one entitled The Orgy of The Cherries - where the stalks and stones are scattered and L'Idylle de Cerises where the cherries are uneaten and the stalks still attached. The L'Idylle de Cerises is a reference from a chapter heading from Rousseau's Les Confessions. Cherries are associated with sexual pleasure and Rousseau mentions them in a context of mild desire. The book (printed on pink to reflect the colour of the fruit) shows the detritus of cherry eating - with all the stones scattered - as a metaphor for an orgy when all the participants are exhausted and strewn across the bed. VG+.

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26 Dec

Posted at 15:31h in Artist's Books

Dunsyre, : Wild Hawthorn Press, (1981)
12 x 12cm, 40pp plus card wrappers and printed photo-pictorial dust jacket.
Artist's book where Finlay has placed translations of the Anaximander Fragment (the earliest known extant philosophical thesis) opposite images of a broken classical column and its base found in the extended grounds of Little Sparta (then Stoneypath). The column was of course deliberately partly destroyed as the original artwork. The images, in b/w , were by Harvey Dwight.
The philosophers cited here are Diels, Nietzsche, Heidegger, Jaeger, Weil, Kahn, Kirk, Hussey, Burnet, Lloyd-Jones and Jaspers.
The fragment from Anaximander (600 BC) is a statement about how life has to make way for death out of necessity and each translation has subtle different meanings. Of course, the fact that only a tiny amount of the thoughts of Anaximander has survived into the present day is a mirror of the ruined (by intent) column.
The consideration of man's death is a major theme running through much of Finlay's output - and this falls heavily in the middle of his fascination of momento mori and similar works. VG+ example of a very scarce book.

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23 Dec

Posted at 12:07h in Artist's Books

Dunsyre, : Wild Hawthorn Press, (1981)
17.8 x 13.9cm, light brown outer folder content of three 1pp sheets each with a concrete poem on them. The first two are on blue card and are presumably the two epicurian poems - the first has lines which represents a wafer surrounded by water (a wafer being a dry slice of something may be seen as land and the water as sea hence the whole an island), the second shows descending lines of water and one representing a bird swooping vertically down. These works remind one of a modern typographic equivalent of Apollinaire's calligrammes.
The final work is on orange paper (Finlay often used these colour combinations)and shows a triangle and a circle - the first is meant to be the scent of oranges, the second the scent of pears. The citrus of oranges is sharp like the corners of the triangle. This latter poem is meant to be a paradox and that is because of the shapes - the "Sharp" orange is not round while the pair is not a triangle which broadly is the shape of a pair..
Epicurean philosophy promoted simplicity, enjoyment and calmness as the way to a better life. In modern times the word is more associated with someone who enjoys food. Finlay seems to be happy with the simple life.
These works are usually placed in the artist's book section of Finlay's raisonne but there is a strong case for them to be small prints. But for now we have retained them in the former category. VG+ in like folder.

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01 Dec

Posted at 11:27h in Artist's Books

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1981
9.7 x 5.7cm, 8pp plus printed red wrappers. Artist's book which lists two groups of names - the first Angelique, Tilleul, Pavot, Serpolet, Cheverefgeuille and Thym are listed as "a litany for Prairial". These are French names for herbs and Prairial is not only the Ninth revolutionary month (beginning in May) but also the time when the Law of 22 Prairial, also known as the loi de la Grande Terreur, was passed that gave power to the Committee of Public Safety that Robespierre turned into the dictatorship of the Terror. Herbs, of course, are picked and chopped up and consumed.
The second list "A requiem for Thermidor" has the names of the members of the Committee of Public Safety - Fleuriot, Hanriot, Couthon, Payan, Robespierre and Saint-Just. These were the victims of their own Terror when they were guillotined during the Thermidorian reaction (Robespierre went to his death in severe pain as he had tried to commit suicide only to partially blow off his own jaw in the attempt, Saint-Just was dignified and stoic).
The colours of the book papers are red, white and blue - the colours of the republic's tricolour.
The Litany is one of religious praise - here for the spring but with foreboding and foreshadowing of the destruction of the Terrorists. The requiem a cry of pain for the deposed leaders who killed so many by dictat.

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18 Aug

Posted at 10:53h in Artist's Books

Edinburgh: Graeme Murray Gallery, 1981 16 x 16cm, 60pp plus card covers and printed dustjacket. Three fold outs and one work reproduced in colour as frontispiece. Artist's book (one suspects it was also an exhibition catalogue given Murray was the dealer for the works included but this is not mentioned and Finlay is noted as having designed the book) which shows duotone images (by Hani Latif) of 17 inscribed large pebbles (or rocks really) with found texts from philosophers, poets and others. The texts on the stones reflect the quotations. The sculptures were made under Finlay's instruction by Richard Grasby. One thousand copies were printed. VG although slight rippling to the dustjacket.
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21 May

Posted at 13:49h in Artist's Books

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1981.
24.8 × 30.5cm, 32pp plus pictorial card covers. A somewhat rare artist's book which has eight full colour lithographs of water colour paintings of poppies by Ian Gardner on thick paper bound in with titles by Finlay. A rather lovely book the theme is similar to other books where German Panzer tanks are well camouflaged in nature. Here the camouflage is perfect - one cannot see the tanks at all. In a suppliment bound in at the back - Finlay has added numberous epigrams relating to tanks and camouflage.

"Total War prompts a Total War Art."

This is one of only 200 copies signed by both Finlay and Gardner on the last page.VG+.

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18 Dec

Posted at 10:56h in Artist's Books

n.p. : Parret Press, 1981
9 x 10.5cm, 28pp plus card covers. One of Finlay's most rare books this is a book of "definitions" where a common word is given (usually a classical) new definition. For example,:

HARE, n. a creature second in swiftness to the tortoise.

One of only 75 copies each of which is signed by Finlay published at Christmas 1981 - this example has sadly had some water damage in the past which can be seen on the outside and inside of the cover and along the inner spine although the texts and inner pages are unaffected.

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18 Sep

Posted at 11:36h in Artist's Books

Dunsyre, Lanark: Wild Hawthorn Press, n.d. (1980)
6 x9.2cm, 8pp plus card wrappers and printed dust jacket. The four printed pages has one word each:
5. Baroque
6. Barque
7. Bark
8. Baroque
and there is a reference to W. Lee Rensselaer's Names on Trees on the inner cover. That book is a literary and artistic analysis of the story of Angelica and Medoro in Ariosto's Orlando Furioso. One aspect of Angelica's love for Medoro is that she carved the lovers' names on trees. Hence once can read the book as a visual poem of boats (Barque/Bark) and woods (Bark/Baroque) with the reference to baroque also referring to the art style of the 17th century. VG+

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03 Sep

Posted at 11:47h in Artist's Books

Dunsyre, Lanark: Wild Hawthorn Press, n.d. (1980) 13.6 x 8cm, 4pp plus blue wrappers. Artist's book where Finlay has only two different paper types bound together in the wrappers - one is blue and the other is white. There is a reference to Henty Vaughan's "The Timber. Silex Scintillans" on the back fold.
Vaughan was a metaphysical poet of the 17th century and Silex Scintillans published in 1650 was a major religious text which was published in two volumes with a significant gap in time between them (possibly due to illness) . The Two Billows of the title refers to the two volumes and the change in colour of the two pages reflects the differences in the two books. A visual poem with a literary and religious meaning although the boat vignette on the cover may suggest the more literal meaning of two billows - two pushes of air helping the vessel steer a true course. VG+.

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06 Jul

Posted at 16:17h in Artist's Books

Little Sparta; Wild Hawthorn Press, 1980. 14.3 x 8.5cm, c.32pp plus original wrappers. Artist's book with a number of descriptive poems by Finlay which end with a pointing finger as if the artist expects the scene to be drawn by the reader on a blank facing page.

"A statue of Eve reaching up to pick an apple, placed under an apple tree."

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18 Nov

Posted at 11:07h in Artist's Books

Dunsyre, Lanark: Wild Hawthorn Press, n.d. (1979)
10 x 5.2cm, 18pp (printed on one side only) accordion fold. The artist's book has the text: "Typography which used to flow like rivers" - but all but the last two words are sent vertically rather than horizontally. A comment on experimental typography which infers disapproval although how a visual/concrete poets could take that view is hard to accept. The vertical section might be compared to waterfalls after all. VG+.

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18 Oct

Posted at 11:18h in Artist's Books

Dunsyre, Lanark: Wild Hawthorn Press, n.d. (1979)
10 x 5.2cm, 18pp (printed on one side only) accordion fold. The artist's book has a text printed vertically: "VTOLP" and then a few pages later "V/S" and the next page the TOLP is printed as an upward ascending text.
This is a concrete poem relating to the abbreviation of Vertical Take Off and Landing plane which first revealed to the public in the mid 1960s. The first page shows the passage of the plane upwards, the second is a representation of a normal plane taking off at an angle. We cannot work out what the "S" in the second typographic section stand for however. A shame but we continue to research this. VG+.

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