IAN HAMILTON FINLAY

ARTIST’S POSTCARDS

THE AERONAUT PRINZ EUGEN. 1996.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1996
9.5 x 16cm, 1pp black on white card with a photograph of Loch Echen at Little Sparta.

THE AERONAUT PRINZ EUGEN

sank
somewhere
here

An effigy
now
of itself

Prinz Eugene was the German Battle Cruiser from the second world war and was scuttled after the war remaining partly emerged. FInlay's poem seems to remember a crashed model (and its occupant) named after the real boat which one presumes ended up in the Loch (actually a large pool). VG+.

HESIOD: AN EPIGRAM ON THE COMMON FISHERIES POLICY. 1996.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1996
9.9 x 13.9cm, 1pp black on blue card with the epigram:

All that we did not want to catch, we kept, and all that we wanted to take home we throw over the side

The card reflects a then current political dispute about conservation of fish - the European Community forcing fishermen to take account of their actions when over-fishing which of course was unpopular amongst the working fleet. The original epigram apparently referred to lice (All that we caught we left behind, and all that we did not catch we carry home" from the Epigrams of Homer. Finlay spins this with some mis-placed sympathy for the modern fisherman. VG+.

SPARROW. 1996.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1996
12.7 x 13.9cm, 1pp full colour reproduction of a painting of one of Finlay's toy boats by Janey Boulton. On the reverse is a Finlay "definition" poem -

SPARROW, n. a plain brown bird of the finch family.

The card is a visual poem with the painting having similar colourings to the bird and it seems likely that the model is also somewhat small. VG+.

Janet Boulton

TWO INTERPOLATIONS. 1996. IN ORIGINAL PRINTED ENVELOPE.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1996
10 x 6.8cm printed manilla envelope content of a 9.8 x 6.6cm, 2pp black on green card with texts on both sides which are quotations from others to which Finlay has added text. The first discusses the meaning of PAN to the Greeks - the final part of which notes Arcady to be the "homeland of the Panzer divisions" a common Finlay trope. The other text discusses the Poussin painting ARCADIAN SHEPHERDS - Finlay's addition claims the words on the tomb to be VIRTUE and TERROR (from the French revolution) instead of the original "Et in Arcadia ego". The latter another common Finlay theme. Both VG+.

BOREAS. 1996.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1996
6.5 x 5cm, 4pp black on white small artist's card which internally reads:

BOREAS
Plank bender

The drawing is of a tool used in model making that allows thin wood to be bent. Boreas being the North wind which makes growing trees bend under the forces of nature. VG+.

PENCILLING IN A PORTHOLE. 1996.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1996
15.3 x 12.4cm, 42pp black on white artist's card with a drawing by Gary HIncks of a model making process where the holes in the side of the model representing porthole are made by pushing a pencil through the wood. The card is dedicated as a "Homage to SImon Cutts" - a writer and poet who presumably makes his mark on the world by the use of a pencil also. VG+.

Gary Hincks

BITTS. BITS. 1996.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1996
13.4 x 12.4cm, 2pp black on white artist's card with small drawings by Heather Deedman of wooden joints and supports. The card is entitled

BITTS
bits

. Bitts on a boat are posts on a deck or fastening mooring lines or cables. The closeups of each Bitt may be seen as bits of Bitts. VG+.

Heather Deedman

MIRROR. 1996.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1996
14 x 6cm, 4pp black on blue artist's card with a drawing by John Andrew of a boat on the front. On the back there is a "definition" work:

Mirror, n. a boat we can see ourselves in.

A comment that not only suggests a boat may have characteristics of the owner but has a double meaning that one can imagine oneself sailing it. VG+.

John Andrew

HOMAGE TO POST-IMPRESSIONISM. 1996.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1996
11.2 x 16cm, 2pp artist's card with a full colour photograph by Pia Maria Simig of a model boat by Finlay. The highly colourful boat with its orange/red nets is an homage in colour to paintings of boats by Van Goch. VG+.

PIA MARIA SIMIG

A TRADITIONAL RUSSET TINT. 1996.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1996
13.4 x 14.2cm, 2pp brown on cream artist's card with typography by Michael Harvey in an old-fashioned style. The text notes that linseed oil, cod oil, red ochre, yellow ochre and seawater caused the colouring on older sails as if deliberately painted. VG+.

MICHAEL HARVEY

ECHOES SERIES. A VARIATION ON HEIDEGGER. 1996.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1996
18.5 x 12cm, 4pp black on cream artist's card. Internally a poem is a loose translation/adaption from Heideggert's Aus der Erfahrung des Denkens a book about poetry and philosophy. Finlay points to the joys and inspirations one can take from the ordinary.
The Echoes Series are writings or poems by Finlay that use another work as a starting point to expand on the original or detourn it. VG+.

ARCADIA – W.D. PROPERTY. 1996. HAND ADDRESSED BY FINLAY TO JANET BOULTON.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1996
10.6 x 15cm, 2pp artist's card. The front of the card has a fake notice that Arcadia is now W.D. (War Department - an old designation not used in 1996) and on the reverse an announcement that "following the action taken by Strathclyde Region, the Garden, Little Sparta will be closed to the public during 1996." This card was hand addressed to Janet Boulton and mailed to her else VG+.