Ao fazer uma das minhas “viagens
virtuais” pelas livrarias no estrangeiro, despertou-me a atenção esta – Donald Heald Rare Books, Prints & Maps
| 124 East 74th St, | New York | NY 10021 | USA, que nos oferece excelentes
exemplos de livros antigos e impressos nas áreas de botânica, ornitologia,
história natural, americana e canadiana, nativos americanos, viagens e explorações,
mapas e atlas, fotografia e muito mais.
“Founded in England in 1972, we have formed
and contributed to important private and institutional collections. Items of
note which we have placed include a unique copy of Abbot’s Natural History of
the Rarer Lepidopterous Insects of Georgia with plates on vellum, an extremely
rare extra-illustrated large paper Spanish edition of Blaeu’s Atlas Mayor,
Curtis' North American Indian, a copy of the Federalist in boards, the first separate printing of the Bill of
Rights, and a large paper issue of Redouté Les Roses with the plates in two
states.
We are renowned for our extensive
print inventory which is unsurpassed in quality. The Sporting collection recently incorporates
the complete print stock of Ackermann & Son of London, established in 1783.
We are members of the Antiquarian Booksellers
Association of America, where Mr. Heald has served on the Board of Governors as
Treasurer, Security Chairperson, and as Chairman of the New York Antiquarian
Book Fair. We are members of the International League of Antiquarian
Booksellers, and the American Historical Print Collectors Society. Mr. Heald is
a member of the Grolier Club, and the American Antiquarian Society.”
“Books, prints and
maps are shown by appointment only. Please contact us to schedule an
appointment. – info@donaldheald.com”
Na secção Voyages & Travel encontrei
este exemplar que, para além de nos revelar todo o fascínio do Oriente, reúne todas
as condições para ser uma obra de elevada qualidade: excelente encadernação
apesar de ser contemporânea (que não de época), belas ilustrações – aguarelas e
guaches – e em óptimo estado de conservação (apenas com o “pequeno senão” do seu preço!)
CHINA, Canton School.
[Album of exceptional watercolours of
members of the Chinese court, various occupations, landscape views, Chinese
junks and botanical and ornithological subjects]
[Canton: circa
1830]. Small 4to. (9 3/4 x 7 7/8 inches). 61 watercolour and gouache drawings,
on J. Whatman wove paper watermarked 1829, interleaved with blanks. The first
watercolour, within an elaborate border, featuring a seated woman holding a
sheet of paper inscribed G. Jackson, 1836.
Contemporary dark purple straight grained
morocco, covers bordered in gilt and blind with a central device in gilt, spine
wide flat bands in four compartments, tooled in gilt, Liverpool bookseller's
ticket on the front pastedown (Richard Taylor), glazed yellow endpapers, gilt
edges
Provenance: G. Jackson (inscription dated
1836 on tablet on first image)
A lovely album of pre-Opium Wars
Chinese export watercolors of the highest quality.
Beginning in the late 18th
century, centered on the treaty port of Canton, there existed a thriving trade
in watercolours executed by local Chinese artists and sold to the western
merchants and travellers. The best known result of this trade is William
Mason's Costume of China, first published in London in 1800, which is
illustrated with 60 hand-coloured aquatints adapted from a series of original
watercolours by Pu-Qua of Canton.
Importantly, the watercolours in
the present album are of a uniformly higher quality than usually encountered,
including vivid colouring and the use of gold. The subjects include members of
the court and occupations (15), junks and ships (7), landscapes (7) and natural
history subjects including flowers, birds and insects (32). Collections of
Chinese export watercolors were routinely executed on less expensive pith
paper, whereas the present watercolours are on high quality wove paper. The
album represents a more prestigious style of export watercolor paintings
specifically meant for wealthy Europeans. These are Chinese watercolors of the
highest quality, designed and executed to the highest standards.
Chinese export watercolours
occupy "a space which is neither wholly Chinese nor wholly European, but
which can, by the nature of the compromises it makes, tell us a lot about how
one culture saw the other in the age before photography" (Clunas, p. 11).
Crossman, The China Trade
(Princeton: 1972); Clunas, Chinese Export Watercolours (London: 1984).
Item #31334
Price: $30,000.00
Espero que esta obra seja do vosso agrado, pelo menos tanto como eu gostei da vos apresentar.
Saudações bibliófilas.
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