My Book: PKB

by Artist: Unknown. Flourished (1925-1945). Strongly influenced by the Arts & Crafts Movement. Identified by 2 ciphers: PKB and PB

Price: $3,020.00
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Book description:

A bound artists' manuscript created as an affirmation of beauty during WWII by an artist in Great Britain identified only by the ciphers-PKB & PB-working with great skill out of the Arts & Crafts movement with an unusual feel for color and the synergies of black & white. The linocuts, pen & ink decorations, and watercolor illustrations are often exquisite. The calligraphy is of their own pastoral poetry with use of color accents and simple flourishes. The endpapers and book-jacket are decorated with different original, repeating motif designs in colored pen & ink. Linocuts intended for later insertion, preparatory calligraphy studies and a handwritten outline for the work are additionally preserved. PAGINATION: Not paged-24 leaves: 14 leaves with original works by the artist, decorating or illustrating handwritten pastoral poems: following 10 leaves are blank: SIZE: 7.875 x 11.5 inches or 20 x 29 cm. FORMAT: 1/2 plain black cloth and blue paper boards with sewn binding decorated with the artist's original pen & ink jacket & endpapers' designs. ENDPAPERS: Light green flock paper with 2 original, repeating landscape motif designs, executed by the artist in pen & ink in green tints (dark & medium), separate designs for each of the endpapers. Front: Repeating plant nursery design: young plants, root balls in cloth, their stems as gracefully bending vectors, set off against small, kidney shaped garden stones. Rear: Repeating hemlock cone design: cones coupled like flower buds, their needles fanned out below, as if abstract butterfly wings were set on spider legs. JACKET: Cream paper with an original repeating span & branch design over it's entire extent executed by the artist in pen & ink in 5 colors using red, 2 tints of blue, and 2 tints of green. CALLIGRAPHY: From their poetry, (1 exception, first text an extract from Robert Bridges' famous work, "The Testament of Beauty"), and principally executed in black ink with many line ending letters extended with simple flourishes. Title page, poem titles at head of leaves, and some opening letters of stanzas are highlighted in color, matching the principal color of accompanying illustrations. 3 poems have title letters prepared in graphite but never finished and frames for illustrations never inserted: text calligraphy is completed. ILLUSTRATIONS: 24: Many are exquisite, 18 in the book. BOOK: 6 watercolors: 3 culs-de-lampe, 2 large tailpieces and 1 full-page tipped on illustration: 9 pen & ink decorations: a large title-page vignette, 2 decorated initials and 6 exquisite culs-de-lampe (2 repeats): 3 superb tipped on linocuts, initialed in the plate. PKB's beautiful line, sensitivity to color, and balancing of black and white are evident throughout. Linocut 1: Frontispiece in 5 colors, initialed in the plate: Depicts an underwater landscape with 2 fish midst a variety of sea vegetation. Linocut 2: "Fungus" in b/w, initialed in the plate: Depicts mushrooms in a clearing on a forest floor, a dense stand of trees in the background, the central mushroom outsized with gills finely rendered. The balance of black & white is exquisite. Linocut 3: "The First Snowdrop" in b/w, initialed in the plate: a beautifully rendered night scene dusted with snow; a grouping of trees on the far side of a tranquil river, their reflections seen as spectral outlines, matching those of the pale moonlight. PRESERVED LOOSE ART: 4 linocuts: A beautiful, small, green and white floral linocut with green border, not initialed. A fine b/w landscape linocut on tissue-thin Japanese paper with a wide black border, not initialed-a larger size-22.5 x 19.5 cm: Depicts a magnificent tree with exposed upper roots stretching over the foreground, behind, unplanted tilled fields rise to a knoll with an indistinct grouping of trees. Condition: Fair: stab hole near inner border: many crinkle-folds at edges: print can be mounted. Repeat of "Fungus": Repeat of "The First Snowdrop", but these with full margins, differently sized in the oriental manner. PREPARATORY STUDIES: 2 Pieces: Note sheet with book outline in pencil, includes placement for poems and linocuts. Verso: pencil draft of a poem: examples of lettering and hash marks. Note sheet on heavy beige paper: Calligraphy study, 12 lines verse, first line, Guide us, inner margin with a large decorated initial in pencil, 5 lines in height, an interlaced tulip and stem decoration descending 13 lines: Verso: 3 stem and branch culs-de-lampe decorations, 1 in pencil, 2 in green ink: Patterns are used in the book, and calligraphy examples in blue, black and red. LINOCUT: Method of making a relief print that substitutes linoleum for wood.

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