Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1994
17.3 x 7cm, 4pp card containing nine "new proverbs" including:
No post
no Possibility.
and
Red, white and blue<BR?isn't blue, white and red.
and
Evening harvests noon.
VG+.
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N.p. (Pittenweem): Cairn Gallery, 1994
14.8 x 10.5cm, 4pp (single sheet folded twice). An artist's card with a prose poem by Finlay:
A pond in the shape of a sailor's collar.
In the middle of the pond
floats a model warship, a
key protruding from one
of its funnels.
The handle of the key suggests a small summer cloud.
BR>
A visual poem created out of words - linking the toy boat to the elements around it.
Scarce. VG+ condition.
BR>...
Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1994
10.5 x 14.2cm, 2pp card designed by Michael Harvey under Finlay's instruction. A brick wall has the words
Holland
WINDMILLS
WATERWAYS
BICYCLES
BRICKS
The cliches of Holland are conjoined with Dutch brick which is (clear from its name) a regional brick which was used to create a different architectural look (and also for ballast in British boats), Dutch bond is also a style of laying bricks in which " the vertical joints of the stretchers in any course are in line with the centres of the first stretchers above and below." as here. VG+.
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Little Sparta: WIld Hawthorn Press, n.d. (1994?)
5.5 x 11.5cm, 4pp artist's card with a drawing by Gary Hinks on the front of Loch Eck - the site of the sinking of the model Aeronaut Schwerer Kreuzer Prinz Eugen. With the model boat having sunk (on 23.6.94) the water shows no sign of the ship. The poem inside the card reads:
not waving
but drowning
not
shrinking
but sinking
a partial reworking of the famous Stevie mith. VG+. ...
Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1994
11 x 14.2cm, 1pp card. A drawing of a lemon by Michael Harvey using architectural methods - as if on a blue print giving plans and body plans. Finlay often uses fruit to represent boats and the various parts of the fruit here are labelled as "aft" or fore". VG+.
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Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1994
13.1 x 10cm, 8pp (concertina folded sheet). Three variants the first being Guillaume Apollinaire's calligramme in the shape of a crown and then two variants by Finlay and Stephen Bann. Finlay's when deconstructed reads "The carp enters who die one by one live on in the hearts of the Jacobins". VG+.
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Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1994
9.4 x 12.6cm, 2pp card with on the front the text "A world cup without Scotland is like a pastoral without sheep." The world cup in 1994 was the first to take place for many years without Scotland (1990 being the last time they actually qualified at time of writing). Finlay's remarks are patriotic in a soccer sense. This example was mailed and hand addressed by Finlay to Janey Boulton. VG+ although some ink from the posting experience. The same card was also released in a card portfolio by Morningstar pPress in the same year. VG+.
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Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1994
8.7 x 6.3cm, 4pp card printed blue on white. Internal to the card is a shaped text that resembles a rounded tree - much like the post-impressionist work of Emile Bernard to which this is noted to be an homage. The text reads: "linen coif in the shape of a cloud l'ecole de Pont-Aven Hommage a Emile Bernard." A coif is a hat (usually a woman's) and often found in the post-impressionist paintings of nuns (especially in Gaugan) and in Bernard's paintings of Breton women - the word shapes resemble such a garment. VG+.
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Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1994
15.5 x 9.1cm, 2pp card with a drawing by Gary Hincks of Saint Sebastian "martyred by liberals making "points".
One of Finlay's many pointed (like arrows) small publications aimed at his enemies both real and imagined. This example is hand addressed by Finlay to his friend and collaborator Janet Boulton. VG+.
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Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, n.d. (1994)
13.0 x 6.5cm, 4pp artist's card with a poem on the front:
wild roses
roses
roses
roses
rove
roses
reefed
Finlay explains that Rove here is a nautical term meaning led through and fastened (as in the case of a rope) and Reefed means to be shortened, taken in. The flowers are bunched and made into a bouquet in this visual poem. VG+.
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Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1994
15.3 x 14cm, 4pp card which has internally a poem for SImon Cutts
DANGER
CORACLE
DOCKING
Cutts' publishing house was called Coracle (the name of a small one-person wood, canvas and pitch boat that is notoriously hard to steer and dock) and the back of the card notes "For Mr S. Cutts in acknowledgement of his recognitions". VG+.
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Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, n.d. (1994)
10.5 x 4.1cm, 2pp. Artist's card in the form of a bookmark where on one side a list of trees which are supposedly "clinker built" where in boats the edges of hull planks overlap each other are found on one side and on the other the list of trees are supposedly "carvel built" where in boats the edges of hull planks are laid edge to edge often with an underlying structure. Finlay finding visual correspondences between the construction methods of the dead tree parts (planks) and the look of the living trees. VG+.
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