IAN HAMILTON FINLAY

ARTIST’S POSTCARDS

BREAD-AND-BUTTER HULL. 1996.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1996
14 x 15.2cm, 2pp. A balsa woodcut by Gary Hincks of a "bread-and-butter hull". Such hulls are used for models and they are hulls which are carved with an open top and the deck constructed using conjoined (by glue in a model) lengths of wood such as might be found on a real ship. Finlay's love of boat models has lasted most of his adult life and one can imagine he sees the very name of such constructions to be a wonderful poetic metaphor. VG+.

MIDSHIP SECTION. 1996. HAND SIGNED BY FINLAY TO HIS SON.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, Christmas 1996
14 x 15.2cm, 4pp card. A drawing by Gary Hincks of a cross section of the midship area of a boat. The parts of the structure are all printed in black except one "carling" which is in red. In shipbuilding, carlings are two pieces of timber laid fore and aft under the deck of a ship, from one beam to another, directly over the keel. Carlings hold the ship together. Other meanings of carlings are less known - an old woman (perhaps a witch) and a type of pea. More than this we do not know - any information about this card would be greatfully received.
This card has a hand-written greeting from Finlay in black ink "love from Dad". VG+

ROWS OF BEANS. 1997.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, n.d. (1997) 7.4 x 6.5cm, 4pp. Artist's postcard a drawing by Gary Hincks of a row of growing beans above which a model airplane has been placed on a string and thin stake presumably to keep birds off the planting.

A text internally reads:

Row of beans
And one old bomber
To scare the birds.


It appears this drawing was from an actual such installation in the garden of Andrew Whittle's Rose Cottage. Whittle was a stone carver and a collaborator with Finlay. VG+.

BEES/BOATS. 1997.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1997
11 x 16cm, 1pp. A quote from Virgil is repeated twice:

-- THEY lightly skim,
And gently sip the dimply river's brim.

One quotation is allocated by Finlay as being about bees, the other boats. VG+.

CLINKER BUILT. 1997.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1997
6 x 2cm, 4pp. One of three cards issued by the press that displays the effects of the "clinker" method of boat building where the edges of hull planks overlap each other. The boat number (which for Finlay is often a poetic construct anyway) is broken up by the irregular sides of the hull. The drawing is by Gary Hincks. VG+.

TRUE VINE. 1997.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1997
19.2 x 8.4cm, 2pp. A linocut by Gary Hincks. A work that is based on Ben Nicholson's Letters and Numbers - here displaying the sides of fish boxes with the various sizes and numbers and port letterings that identify the catches. Added however are IHF (for Finlay), GH (for Gary Hincks) and WHP (for Wild Hawthorn Press).
There were two variations of this card - one green and the other, like here, brown. VG+.

IDYLLE.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, n.d. 16.2 x 6cm, 4pp outer folder in red with inserted 4pp artist's card with a reproduced linocut by Gary Hincks on the front of a raging bonfire and internally a poem by Finlay:

IDYLLE.

Brilliante
blazing
bonfire

Idylle
de la
cerise

The colour of a blazing fire is compared with the colour of cherries (which is matched with the outer paper colour). VG+.

LE COUCHER DU SOLEIL. 1997.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1997
9 x 8.9cm, 4pp artist's card with a thin line drawing by Gary Hincks of boats returning home. Inside Finlay has a poem:

And evening
all
a setting
out
of sails.

The drawing is based on a post-impressionist painting by Henri Riviere - Le Coucher du Soleil - which is usually called The Sunset by anglophones. Finlay, as often found, uses sunset and returning home as a metaphor for death. VG+.

GEE DEES. 1997.

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+.

LEMONS WITHOUT BITTERNESS. 1997.

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+.

ALMOST HALF HER LENGTH AGAIN….. 1997.

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+.

AN URN FOR NOVALIS. 1997.

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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