Ian Hamilton Finlay - Unoriginal Sins

07 Dec GULL. 1996.

Posted at 11:19h in Artist's Postcards

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1996
9.5 x 9cm, 4pp. The front of the card has a line drawing of a part of a carburettor - the mechanism that mixes the fuel and air before combustion. It is not clear if this is for a model or not (but given the artist's interest in model then it seems likely). Internally Finlay creates a poem

Concentric Float Chamber Carburettor - top feed
gull

We suspect the metaphor here is the way seagulls open and close their beaks but in all honesty we are not sure. VG+.

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04 Dec TWO ONE-LINE POEMS FOR POSTIES. 1996.

Posted at 11:10h in Artist's Postcards

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1996
15.2 x 6.7cm, 4pp. Inside the bright red card ate two one-line poems:

On the uneven road the bobbin red sail of the postvan

On the nearby bush the distant postvan's rose-

The colour is crucial here - both metaphors rely on the easily identifiable colour for a sale or a rose. VG+.

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01 Dec ROLLING HOME. 1996.

Posted at 11:05h in Artist's Postcards

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1996
10.5 x 6cm, 4pp. A drawing of a butterfly on the wing by Jo Hincks. Inside is a poem:

ROLLING HOME

Over-
canvassed
Common
Cabbage
White

The Cabbage White is probably the most commonly seen butterfly. VG+.

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30 Nov BRITTANY. 1996.

Posted at 10:33h in Artist's Postcards

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1996
11.3 x 8.7cm, 4pp card with a drawing of women in a harbour Jo Hincks after M Denis printed black on brown.

BRITTANY
litany

The poem suggests that nothing much has changed in these Breton fishing villages, life is a repeating refrain. Finlay also quotes Caroline Boyle-Taylor on this "The painters felt that the peasants' lives had not changes since medieval times". Maurice Denis - the source for the original image - was one of the Symbolists and Les Navis who often documented small communities on canvas especially fishermen. VG+.

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28 Nov 3 FUNNELS. 1996.

Posted at 10:29h in Artist's Postcards

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1996
13.2 x 16.5cm, 2pp card with a b/w photograph by Robin Gillanders of three toilet rolls that have been painted and place on a table such that the image looks like the funnels on a steam boat. VG+.

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22 Nov FRENCH SARDINE LUGGER. 1996

Posted at 10:20h in Artist's Postcards

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1996
17.7 x 12.5cm, 2pp folding card with a watercolour by Janet Boulton after a boat model by Ian Hamilton Finlay identified as a "French Sardine Lugger". Boulton did a number of such paintings and Finlay seems to have enjoyed them. VG+.

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21 Nov GRAINS OF SALT. 14 ONE-WORD POEMS. 1996.

Posted at 19:22h in Artist's Books

Llandudno: Oriel Mostyn, 1996
28 x 22cm, 40pp plus boards, First edition of this artist's book with a commentary by Harry Gilonis published on the occasion of an exhibition in North Wales. One fold out page. A series of linocuts by Jo HIncks illustrate one line poems by Finlay all of which are marine scenes.

"A grey shore between day and night" is "dusk" with an image of a boat.

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17 Nov ENCHANTMENT. 1996.

Posted at 10:13h in Artist's Postcards

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1996
10.2 x 5.2cm, 4pp folding card printed green and blue on white with the text reversed. The two inner folds read:

Faint,
Lingering
Under
The
Elms

and

Faint,
Lingering
Under
The
Eaves

Both poems have the word FLUTE made up of their first letters and this indicates that both poems should be associated with sound. The former with birds in the trees (the birds' home), the second with sounds in a home. Finlay finds both sounds "enchanting" and magical one assumes. A pretty card. VG+.

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03 Nov 3 POSTS FOR A STREAM. 1996.

Posted at 10:06h in Artist's Postcards

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1996
8.2 x 8.2cm, 8pp folding concertina card printed black on light brown. The three folds read:

LEAF & BOAT

BOAT & BARK

BARK & LEAF

Each recombination infers a different poetic image - the first the similarity between a floating leaf and a boat, the second the wood that makes up both boat and bark (bark peeled away will form a hollow structure) and finally the tree itself. VG+.

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01 Nov GRONYNNAU O HALEN/GRAINS OF SALT. 1996.

Posted at 12:52h in Invitation Cards

Llandudno: Oriel Mostyn, n.d. (1996)
15 x 21cm, 4pp. Exhibition announcement card for a Welsh solo show - the front of the card is a linocut by Jo HIncks from the artist's book/exhibition catalogue Grains of Salt. VG+.

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01 Nov BLUE FLOWER. 1996.

Posted at 09:55h in Artist's Postcards

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1996
14.7 x 11.5cm, 2pp. A colour image by Cornelia Wieg of carved names on a tree that has been rotated by 90 degrees to make the work seem abstract and somewhat like a photograph of a flower. This is one of three times this image is used in a Finlay publication - once as an editioned print, once as a card (here) and also on an announcement card for the print. There is a longer discussion of this work on the print entry in this cataloguing. VG+.

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27 Oct EURO 96. 1996. SIGNED AND DEDICATED TO PAUL ROBERTSON BY STUART MILLS.

Posted at 09:43h in Artist's Postcards

Little Sparta/Nottingham: Wild Hawthorn Press/Tarasque Press, 1996
15.5 x 11.3cm, 2pp. A constellation of short translated haiku which were previously allocated to their Japanese authors have the names of the original writers crossed out and replaced by names from the English National football time such as:

Breakwater posts
the sea so calm
on the other side

Paul Gascoigne

The original poems were translated by Stuart Mills and Finlay appended the footballers. Finlay suggesting that the poems give up some essence of the sportsman.
This card has a short dedication in ink on the back from Mills to Robertson "for Paul from Stuart". VG+.

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