Books

Rare first issue of the first edition for Bernard Shaw’s first published novel. Shaw, George Bernard. An Unsocial Socialist. London: Swan Sonnenschein, Lowery & Co., 1887. First Edition, First Issue. Crown 8vo, 7 3/8 x 5 inches (188 x 126 mm); [4] 256 pp.; original red cloth, stamped in gilt on spine and covers, a little rubbed and soiled, spine slightly faded, hinges weak; dark brown endpapers; foxing on first 2 and last 2 sheets. First edition, first issue with "Author of The Confessions of Byron Cashel's Profession etc. etc." to title and no appendix. Ink inscription of Mrs Walter Crane on half title. [Broad, p. 87; Magill p. 965] This is Shaw's first published novel. It had been serialized in "To-Day, A Monthly Magazine of Scientific Socialism" between March and December of 1884. This printing was promptly canceled, and supposedly only samples for booksellers and travelers had been sent out with this title-page. Having attended a meeting by political economist Henry George in September 1882, Shaw became fascinated with Socialism, read Marx and became a member of the Fabian Society in September 1884, writing their first manifesto later that year. He believed in a more moderate, non-violent form of socialism and believed that socialist ideals could best be achieved by infiltration of people and ideas into existing political parties. In the early 1880s Shaw also began his literary career by writing music and art criticism and began writing novels, of which An Unsocial Socialist was the first published. But as his career as a playwright started taking off in the latter part of that decade, his political activities also decreased. Shaw later explained that he had intended An Unsocial Socialist as the first section of a monumental depiction of the downfall of capitalism. Gareth Griffith, in a study of Shaw's political thought, sees the novel as an interesting record of conditions, both in society at large and in the nascent socialist movement of the 1880s. [Griffith, Gareth. Socialism and Superior Brains: The Political Thought of George Bernard Shaw. London: Routledge, 1993]. The story centers on Sidney Trefusis, a millionaire socialist, who leaves his bride on their wedding day because he fears his passion for her will get in the way of his plans to overthrow the British government. Sidney vanished "underground"--Disguises himself as a common laborer called "Mengels"--and infiltrates Alton College, a girl's school where well-bred young women are "fitted and fatted to be put on the marriage market". His plan: take over the school and plant the seed of radical socialism into the fertile brains of the future consorts of cabinet ministers and kings. What he doesn't plan on is the presence of one Agatha Wylie, a sixth-form rabble-rouser, who falls hopelessly in love with both Sidney and his politics, and just happens to be his deserted wife's cousin. Love triangles, mistaken identities, Marx, Engels, pistols and the proletariat jostle for position. (via LibraryThing) An unusual ASSOCIATION COPY with ink inscription and address of "Mrs Walter Crane" [ie Mary Crane] on the half title. Walter Crane married Mary Andrews in 1871 and after a sojourn in Rome returned to London in 1873 living first in Wood End and then at Beaumont Lodge, Shepherd's Bush (the address she has written in this book). In 1914 Mary...

This is a unique facsimile reproduction limited to 987 copies of a medieval manuscript, the Apocalypse Val-Dieu, owned by the British Library, mad...

Author Pamela Golbin and Jean-Louis Deniot A leading name in the international design scene, and a regular in every major shelter magazine in America, his native France and world-...

Mallett catalog from 1997. Softcover catalog photographed in color with all the objects fully described. Typical Mallett catalog of important furniture, porcelain etc. Always a great...

Giovanni Bellini by Philip Hendy and Ludwig Goldscheider. ?Publisher Phaidon; 1945. 1st Ed hardcover with dust jacket. With 6 tipped in color plates and 122 b&w plates. Giovanni Bell...

Ivory Art Deco Statues Galerie Bernard De Leye. Rich book with multiple color pages and excellent photos of a personal collection of some of the best Ar...

Set of old books dating from the 19th century. From an old protestant library near Le Havre in France. These books are called for example  « Commentary on the Psalms ». These beaut...

Collection Léon Levy: Important Mobilier et Objets d'Art. Sotheby's Paris, 2008. 1st Ed hardcover with dust jacket. pp. 281. French and English text. Catalog for the sale of the coll...

Broadway Musical Martin Gottfried 1984 hardcover book.Large heavy book. A colorful tribute to the great Broadway shows of our time. Profusely illustrated in color. New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc. Title Broadway Musicals Author Gottfried, Martin Format/Binding Hardcover Binding Hardcover Publisher Harry N. Abrams Place Of Publication NY Date Published 1984 395 illustrations, 112 in full color. Great oversized heavy coffee table art book. A true treasure of a book. This is a very large book, and not just width wise. It is very tall too. There are many pictures, a lot of them in color. They have some of the rarest flops featured toward the back of the book, and the classics are all here too. Some high points are the run-through of how they make (made) "Annie" run every night. There is also a synopsis of "Hello Dolly" which helpful since I have only seen the movie. There is a flaw though, and it is not insignificant. The author does not separate fact from opinion. Example: "Sweeney Todd does not hold a place in the theater". This book came out the same year "Sweeney Todd" did(1979), so it might be just a bit early to say that. Obviously, he is a critic, but he should have took that hat off ,and taken on the role of an author who looks at the facts.("Sweeney" is just one of the hows that gets criticized.) Colorful entertaining masterpiece with many of these Broadway Musicals some of them are THE WIZ...

First edition, published by Pointed Leaf Press, 2005. Text by Peter Schifando and Jean H. Mathison Drawing on a trove of photographs and archival materials, this book reveals how Wi...

Mallett Catalog 2005. 1st Ed softcover catalog illustrated in color with all the objects fully described. Typical Mallett catalog showcasing important furniture, porcelain etc. Alway...

Tuscany Interiors large hardcover coffee table book By Paolo Rinaldi and Taschen. Nestling in the gentle hills and brushed with the hazy sfumato of the air, the homes of Tuscany hav...

This catalogue accompanies a major exhibition devoted to Vasily Kandinsky. It explores the evolution of his work from the Blaue Reiter to the Bauhaus year...

First edition, published by Little, Brown & Company, 1988. Irving Penn captures the work of Issey Miyake, exploring the artistic relationship between P...

Set of 3 Sotheby's Catalogs: The Jaime Ortiz-Patiño Collections of Silver: 17th Century English Chinoiserie Silver, 18th Century French and English Silver, May 21, 1992 and Silver by...

One of the great 19th-century English color plate books illustrating the scenery along the Seine. Sauvan, Jean Baptiste Balthazar. Picturesque Tour of the Seine, from Paris to the Sea; with Particulars Historical and Descriptive. London: R. Ackermann, 1821. First Edition. 4to, 13 1/2 x 11 (343 x 280 mm), pp. x, 177, title vignette and 24 hand colored aquatints, map. Later three-quarter yellow levant morocco with fillets, spine decorated in gilt with 5 raised bands and black title label; marbled boards and endpapers, a.e.g.. Spine and boards in very good condition, binding tight and square, text and plates with very occasional spotting. [Abbey, Travel 90; Tooley 445; Bobins, Exotic and the Beautiful II: 548] Condition: Near fine. This is a first printing of one of the great nineteenth-century English color plate books illustrating the scenery along the Seine from Paris to Le Havre. Luminous impressions of the plates, beautifully hand-colored. Engraved by Thomas Sutherland (1785 – 1825) and Daniel Havell (1785 – 1826) from sketches and drawings by Augustus Pugin (1812 – 1852) and John Gendall (1790 – 1865), the illustrations also include a vignette on the title page representing the Château de Rosny (home of the Duchess of Berry...

The Metropolitan Museum of Art: The Renaissance in the North. Published by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY, 1987. 1st Ed hardcover with dust jacket. At roughly the same time that Italian art was beginning to reflect a reawakening of the classical spirit—an epoch and style we call the Renaissance—the arts of Northern Europe were experiencing their own efflorescence. Painting, sculpture, and the graphic arts were pursued with a new vigor in the Netherlands, in Germany, in France, and in England, and resulted in a vast body of work that constitutes one of the glories of Western civilization. During the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, the masters of the North developed styles quite distinct from those in the South: an attention to minute detail, particularly with regard to landscape, but also in domestic interiors; and an emotive piety that dramatized the sorrow and suffering of the Passion. Jan van Eyck's Crucifixion and Last Judgment present a horrific vision of the death of Christ and the damnation of sinners, set against a deep and distant landscape, sensitively and realistically rendered. The Lamentation by Petrus Christus...

500 Years of Collecting in Antwerp, A Story of Passions. Rare copy. From the Personal Library of Herbert Kasper. 1st Ed hardcover with dust jacket. The book was Published by: Davidsfonds, Leuven, 2013. Accompanied by a personal note to Herbert Kasper from Thomas Leysen. Leysen was the Chairman of KBC Group between 2011-2020 and wrote the foreword to this book. The KBC, is a banking and insurance group with activities mainly in Belgium, Central Europe and Ireland. Herbert Kasper was an American fashion designer known as "Kasper." He studied English and advertising at New York University and fashion at The Parsons School of Design in New York from 1951–53 and l'Ecole de la Chambre Syndicale de la Couture Parisienne in 1953. He left NYU to serve in the US Army in Europe. After WW II he enrolled at Parsons, where he became a protégé of milliner Fred Frederics. After graduating, he returned to Paris for two years developing his skills in design while working for Jacques Fath, Christian Dior, and Marcel Rochas. When he returned to the US, he worked for Frederics at Mr. John. He was an avid art collector with a famous art collection, and in 2011, the Morgan Library and Museum devoted an exhibition, called “Mannerism and Modernism: The Kasper Collection of Drawings...

By Patricia Reed William Nicholson (1872-1949) is among the most admired and elusive painters in the history of British art. Neither academic nor overtly modernist, his ravishing paintings are a singular achievement of the early twentieth century. Nicholson made his name as a graphic artist in the 1890s before turning to painting full-time. Over the next four decades he explored the genres of portraiture, landscape and still life with exceptional inventiveness, wit and technical skill. Yet his aversion to art groups and his reluctance to make public pronouncements about art have made it difficult to place his work within the main narratives of twentieth-century art history. The breadth of Nicholson's painting is revealed in this sumptuous book, the first fully illustrated catalogue raisonné of the oils. Many of Nicholson's pictures have not been recorded before and most are reproduced here for the first time. The catalogue, which represents more than twenty years of scholarship on the part of its author, Patricia Reed, includes detailed entries on all Nicholson's oil paintings and the most comprehensive chronology of his life to date. The art historian Wendy Baron gives a context for Nicholson in British art at the beginning of the twentieth century, and the painter and critic Merlin James...

The unfolding of the Cubist idea in the years before World War I was perhaps the key episode in the development of modern art. Yet the fact that Cubism emerged from creative dialogue...

Engineered Transparency: The Technical, Visual, and Spatial Effects of Glass Hardcover Book. February 18, 2009 by Michael Bell, Jeannie Kim. Glass is one of the most ubiquitous and...

A very rare DELUXE copy on Japon paper illustrated by James Jacques Tissot with a second set of signed illustrations, from the library of a distinguished French collector, enhanced with signed autograph letters Edmond & Jules de Goncourt, and James Jacques Joseph Tissot. Renée Mauperin; Edition ornée de dix composition à l'eau-forte par James TISSOT. Paris: Charpentier, 1884. Limited Edition. 8vo 10 1/2 x 6 7/8 in. (266 x 175 mm). No. 5 of 20 deluxe illustrated copies printed on imperial japon paper from a total edition of 550. This copy includes 10 original etchings, signed in pencil by James J. Tissot (1836 – 1902) and a second state of each etching, with page number and red ink stamp printed on holla...

A comprehensive study of one of the most versatile artists and acute observers of our time, who fuses art and fashion American artist Sterling Ruby works in a large variety of media, including sculpture, ceramics, painting, and video art. Ruby is influenced by a wide range of sources, including marginalized societies, maximum-security prisons, modernist architecture, artefacts and antiquities, graffiti, waste and consumption, and urban gangs. Through these, he examines the psychological space where individual expression confronts social constraint. ABOUT THE AUTHOR Kate Fowle is chief curator for Garage Museum of Contemporary Art in Moscow and director-at-large at Independent Curators International (ICI) in New York. Franklin Sirmans is director of the Pérez Art Museum in Miami. Jessica Morgan is director of the Dia Art Foundation in New York. Sterling Ruby is based in Los Angeles and is represented by SpruthMagers (London, Berlin, Los Angeles), Xavier Hufkens...

This beautiful book is a celebration of one of the truly original, daring and bravura talents of the decorative arts in the Paris of the 1930s and 1940's. Berard's sets and costumes ...

First Edition, published by Westover, Richmond, Virginia, 1972. The wonderful staged surrealism of Arthur Tress’s black and white photographs, bordered in white on a black page, are set opposite the words of novelist John Minahan, guiding us through the images, dreams and encounters that inform each page. Shot amidst the urban decay...

Christie's 12/2010 The Barratt Collection from Crowe Hall, Bath. 1st Ed softcover auction catalog. Christie’s offered the contents of one of the finest Regency villas in Bath, Crowe Hall, at the King Street salerooms on Thursday, 16 December 2010. Crowe Hall was the home of Sir Sydney Barratt (1898-1975), a chemist whose advice to Sir Winston Churchill and the War Cabinet from 1942 to 1944 helped to secure the development of the ‘bouncing bomb’. The sale was expected to raise in excess of £1.8 million and included Old Master and British pictures...

The complete works of Prolific French designer, Charlotte Perriand. Includes volumes 1-4 encompassing her life and works from 1903-1999. Volume 1 and 3 in French and Vol 2 and 4 in E...

Designs for Gilt Bronze Objects from the French Restoration 1814-1830: Clocks, Candelabras, Chandeliers, Sconces and Inkwells, by Charles Plante. Publis...

Roy Lichtenstein helped usher in the pop art movement in America in the 1960s with his large-scale paintings of comic-book panels and his deadpan renditions of consumer-product adver...

An endless expanse of shimmering waters paired with unmatched Greek hospitality awaits visitors to the islands of the Aegean Sea. Each island is home to a unique spirit and mythology. From Patmos (a favorite of Aga Khan) to Hydra (which captivated Henry Miller, Leonard Cohen and Sophia Loren), the islands are imbued with a seductive sense of history, tradition and adventure. Several films over the decades have been filmed on them, including Boy on a Dolphin (1957) on Hydra, The Big Blue (1988) on Amorgos and The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants (2005) on Santorini. Sources of inspiration for millennia, the ancient ruins, cliffside monasteries and volcanic rims are all can’t-miss sights. Venturing on an Odyssey of their own, the author and the photographer boarded a traditional Greek sailboat and set out to capture the calming atmosphere, quintessential characters and breathtaking architecture of these gems of the Aegean. A spectacular journey re-created in the pages of Greek Islands. Chrysanthos Panas is a businessman, art collector and philanthropist from Athens. He is in the hospitality industry and co-owner, with his brother Spyros, of several well-known clubs and restaurants in Greece, such as Island, Athénée and Salon de Bricolage. He is an expert in destination management and one of the first to use the term “Athens Riviera...

Sumptuously produced treatment of the aesthetic and spiritual qualities of traditional Japanese architecture that resonated with and influenced Western modernism—think the simplicity and abstract beauty of tatami geometry combined with a holistic philosophy of indoor/outdoor living. The book itself is a cynosure of academic and graphic quality, with text by Walter Gropius and Kenzo Tange...

The Borzoi Poe, two volume boxed set. The complete poems and stories of Edgar Allan Poe. Published in 1982 by Alfred A. Knopf of New York.

1st Edition Published by Les Editions de L’Amateur 2008 A beautiful book reference book with superb images by Felix Marcilhac condition: very good dimensions: 31 x 24 x 3 cm.

Italian Master Drawings: From the Wolfgang Ratjen Collection 1525--1835, Personal Property of Herbert Kasper. Published by Paul Holberton Publis...

Cast Iron & Tin Toys of Yesterday with a Price Guide Don Cranmer. Published by L-W Promotions, Sharon Center, OH, 1974. 1st Ed softcover, 108 pages with 100's of illustrations and an...

Welcome to HAY's universe of irresistible, affordable, everyday design. In 2002, husband and wife Rolf and Mette Hay founded their namesake company and forever changed how the world perceives Scandinavian design. Born from the duo's desire to make outstanding design available to all, HAY reimagines functional objects, turning couches, cutting boards, towels, and toothbrushes into vibrant items that bring joy to one's daily life. Simple, stylish, and affordable, HAY's furniture and accessories are a seamless blend of quality and economy. The brand's deep connections within the art, food, fashion, and broader cultural communities, as well as its exuberant use of color - icy pastels, Memphis primary colors, rich jewel tones, and vivid near-neons, ensure HAY's best-selling products including the Mags Sofa, Matin Lamp, About A Chair...

Giovanni Pietro Olina. UCCELLIERA; Overo discorso della natura e proprietà di diversi uccelli e in particolare di que' che cantano, con il modo di prendergli, conoscergli, allevargli...

A lovely example of an intimate 19th century memorabilia album illustrating the era's sensibilities for nature and antiquities, and bound in an exquisite blank album with miniature v...

Scavullo Women published in 1982 by Harper & Row, New York. Written by Francesco Scavullo, with 46 of his portraits and candid interviews. The black cloth bound book with its origina...

Jacob Lawrence - The Migration Series. Softcover book, published by The Rappahannock Press in association with The Phillips Collection, Washing...

Antique Japanese Samurai Manga book Edo period, circa 1840 Woodblack print book Book dimensions: 224mm x 156 mm There are damages becau...

Cyrano's nose got in the way of his heart. A must-have for collectors of French classics. Rostand, Edmond (1868 – 1918). Cyrano de Bergerac. Paris: Librairie Charpentier et Fasq...

An early illustrated edition of Jerusalem Delivered by Torquato Tasso (1544 – 1595) "La Gerusalemme Liberata; Di Torquato Tasso – Figurata da Bernardo Castello – con le annotationi ...

This landmark book reflects on almost 70 years of works by Bridget Riley (b.1931), from some of her earliest to very recent projects, providing a unique record of the work of an arti...

4 Volumes. Sir Thomas Mallory, Le Morte D'Arthur. Limited Edition. Bound by Riviere in full blue morocco with the covers displaying gilt-tooled borders and open-tooled false latches ...

AUTHOR: DICKENS, Charles. TITLE: Our Mutual Friend. (20 Parts in 19). PUBLISHER: London: Chapman and Hall, 1865. DESCRIPTION: FIRST EDITION A PERFECT SET IN THE ORIGINAL 19 PARTS. first issue of text with "pricipal" for "principal" in part 14, illustrated by Marcus Stone, original pictorial blue paper wrappers. CONDITION: A completely unsophisticated set with none of the spines being rebacked, some wear to the head and foot of spines, chipping to a few corners, internally clean and bright...

Les cinglés du chocolat Hardcover French Edition. Text in French small Size. Dimensions: 8.5 in x 5.5 in x 0.5 in. Les cinglés du chocolat by Sandra Boynton, Jean-Jacques Brisebarre, Sylvie Girard. Published: 1987. English title: Chocolate: The Consuming Passion. CHOCOLATE continues to delight chocoholics everywhere. Packed with Boynton's famous hippos, bunnies, pigs, and other animals, this gift-perfect book is a whimsical commentary on the individual's relationship to chocolate, its varieties, and its sources. From the several sorts of chocolate connoisseur-including the gourmoo, who eats only milk chocolate-to the several shapes of chocolate itself (bunny, kiss, glove compartment bar), Boynton's apologia for chocolate misses nothing. Myths are chocolate is not fattening, she argues, especially when the caloric expenditure of carrying it home from the store and hiding it from company is factored in. Directions are to remove stains, lick them. Plus, how to grow chocolate at home, a foolproof method for determining if chocolate is in season (does the name of the month contain the letter A, E, or U?), and a recipe for Hippo Pot de Mousse. "Fourteen out of ten people like chocolate," says the artist. This is the only guide for people who like chocolate the way they like to breathe. Résumé in French: Léger, drôle, amusant, le livre illustré avec humour analyse et présente tout ce qui touche de près...

Decorate a study or a library with this elegant set of French books, printed in Paris between 1960-1969, each book has a brown bound cover embellis...

Journey high above the world's most unforgettable waterscapes via this stunning collection of aerial photographs by David Ondaatje. Water Views is a brea...

Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Zapolya: A Christmas Tale; in Two Parts: The Prelude entitled "The Usurper's Fortune;" and The Sequel, entitled "The Usurper's Fate." London: Rest Fenner, ...

Tennyson, Alfred. The Lover's tale. London: C. Kegan Paul & Co., 1879. First Edition. 16mo, 6 1/2 x 4 1/4 in. (165 x 109 mm), 95 pp + 4pp ads; fine FULL TAN CRUSHED MOROCCO BY ZA...

“Flipping through a few pages will transport you . . . Armchair travelers rejoice.” – AD PRO Explore interior-design masterpieces around the globe from the 1940s to today with this unique geographically arranged survey – discover iconic rooms in 9 continental regions in this ground-breaking survey spanning more than 50 countries This unparalleled global survey features more than 400 of the most inspirational residential rooms from the past eight decades. With the work of icons of interior design past and present, such as Kelly Behun, Stéphane Boudin, Jacques Grange, Peter Marino, Brigette Romanek...

Author Clive Aslet, Foreword by John Simpson New homes, featuring interiors, gardens, and furniture from London-based architect John Simpson, famed des...

Bacon is one of the most painterly artists of our time: his colour-drenched canvases are disturbing and stimulating. This volume comprises his series of portraits and self-portraits,...

Highly important, Frederik Sieck's work on Danish furniture design is considered a classic and authoritative work. It gives a short illustrated...

A comprehensive, yet flexible and holistic approach to the human body for artists, Roberto Osti’s method of teaching anatomy is exhaustive, but never loses sight of the fact that this understanding should lead to the creation of art. Basic Human Anatomy...

First monograph to present the work of LaGuardia Design Group, a highly regarded landscape architecture firm specializing in contemporary residential design in the Hamptons. With offices in Water Mill, LaGuardia Design Group is immersed in the fragile landscape of the Hamptons, both its woods and meadows and the dramatic shoreline along the Atlantic. Notable projects include the rebuilding of the dunescape surrounding a landmark Norman Jaffe...

Lost, forgotten, reimagined, and transformed: the compelling beauty of abandoned, reinvented, and rescued architecture Ruin and Redemption in Architecture captures the awe-inspir...