Search Results: Italy from Bernett Penka Rare Books LLC

Unpaginated volume consisting of 6 pages (three leaves printed recto and verso) of musical notation by Malipiero, written presumably for the piano in standard treble and bass clefs, in 14 brief sections, followed by 14 plates depicting three-color abstract line and geometric drawings by Veronesi, in which one can see changes and variations developing. Oblong 8vo. Original wrpps. with three-color typographic design. Very minor soiling. Milan (Tip. A. Lucini & Co.) 1939. Signed to front flyleaf by Veronesi and Malipiero. Veronesi was an Italian photographer, painter, scenographer, and film director who trained early on as a textile designer before getting into first photography and then painting. He traveled to Paris in the 1930s where he met Léger and joined the photographic group Abstraction-Création. In March 1935, he participated in the first collective exhibition of abstract art in Italy, together with Oreste Bogliardi, Cristoforo De Amicis, Ezio D'Errico, Lucio Fontana, Virginio Ghiringhelli,… Read More

1686. (24), 456, (36) pp. detailed text on artworks in hundreds of Roman churches and palazzi, each building getting its own entry ranging from a paragraph or two to several pages, and including works by Caracci, Mantegna, Gozzoli, Carlo Fontana, Cortese, Domenichino, Borromini, Guido Reni, da Vinci, Lorenzo Lotti, Michelangelo, Gentileschi, Giotto, da Cortona, Luca della Robbia, Masaccio, Raphael, Titian, and hundreds of other artists and architects, full indices of churches and artists. Minor pen notation to title page, some minor notations to inside covers. 16mo. Old vellum. Minor soiling, a few minor losses to vellum along spine and at corners. Rome (Giuseppe Vannacci) 1686. Rossetti 10918, Schudt 282, Fossati Bellani 757, Sicari 241, Kissner 980, Schlosser pp. 595, 600. Provenance: From the library of Sergio Rossetti. A completely revised edition, by the author himself, of his "Studio di Pittura, Scultura, Architettura" of 1674. Descriptions of the Vatican and other palaces are newly added to… Read More

Carracci. 2 vols., XIV, 183, 123 pp. monograph on the Italian Baroque painter (1560-1609), notes, catalogue raisonné, bibliography, indices, 477 illustrations in the text and on plates (10 color). Complimentary article attached to front end-paper. 4to. Cloth, tear to dust jacket of first volume. London (Phaidon) 1971. (Kress Foundation Studies in the History of European Art). Freitag 1754. Arntzen R 74.

Antique Italian bingo-type game set, likely late 19th or early 20th century, comprised of cardboard game board with 90 gold-numbered spaces on red ground with embossed gold paper frame, 90 hand-numbered wooden game tokens, and 15 sets of 87 total individual cards, housed in 8 colored cardstock sleeves, the cards hand-numbered and with hand-colored empty spaces. Some light age-appropriate wear and soiling, minor abrasions to board surface and corners, overall very good. Board measures approx. 13-1/2 by 13-1/2 inches, most cards 2-5/8 by 4-3/4 inches. Wooden tokens and cards housed together in a paper-covered cardboard box, contents loose as issued. N.p., n.d. Tombola is a traditional Italian board game very similar to bingo, first played in Naples in the 18th century. Traditionally, players would cover the numbers on their individual cards with beans, lentils, or pieces of orange or tangerine peel. The cards included here comprise 15 sets, labeled on the outsides of the sleeves and the backs of the… Read More

Milano: Stampa Archiepiscopale, 1661. Small folio (32.8 x 23 cm). Later paper boards backed with likely original vellum, later hand-lettering of title to spine; (xii), 406, (vi) pp. Very light scattered toning and foxing, original frontispiece and portrait missing and replaced with reproductions, overall very good. An original 17th century treatise on architectural proportions by an Italian mathematics and architectural drafting professor. The treatise is divided into sections including the definition of various lines and angles, proportional divisions of straight lines, and chapters on each of the architectural orders, including Tuscan, Doric, Ionic, Corinthian, and Composite. The volume is illustrated throughout with numerous geometric woodcuts in the text and additional scattered engraved decorations. It represents a contemporary publication of Osio's simplified method for the construction of the architectural orders via angles alone, without modules or arithmetic divisions. This is the second… Read More

Double-sided poster/catalog from the first major exhibition of abstract art in Italy, held in Rome at the Galleria Roma from March through April 1948, containing a sort of manifesto about abstract art, a statement on the exhibition from Ettore Sottsass Jr., additional texts from Piet Mondrian, George Morris, G. Formaggio, Le Corbusier, Max Bill, Gillo Dorfles, Josef Albers, Fernand Leger, and Wassily Kandinsky, with reproductions of works by a number of participating artists. 60 x 46.6 cm. Some very slight toning, expected creases along fold lines, very good condition overall. Torino (S.E.T.) 1948. This first exhibition of abstract art in Italy was organized by Achille Perilli, a Roman painter and sculptor and member of the group Forma 1, and Ettore Sottsass, Jr., an architect also known for designing furniture, jewelry, glass, lighting, ceramics, and other aspects of interiors, often in brilliant colorsm and founder of the Memphis Group. Participating artists included many of the greats of abstract,… Read More

207 pp. descriptive catalogue of the museum's collection of 466 Italian and Spanish Renaissance and Baroque sculptures (excluding bronzes), notes, bibl., all 466 illus. in the text, many with multiple views and details. Lg. 4to. Printed cloth. Berlin (Reimer) 1913. Ex-library copy (bookplate on endpaper). An ex-library copy in excellent condition.

Carpioni. 169 pp. monograph on the Italian painter (1613-1679) based in Vicenza, detailed and fully documented catalogue raisonné of paintings and engravings (documented, attributed, wrongly attributed, etc.), concordances, locations of works, extensive notes, bibliography, indices, 209 illustrations on plates (5 in color). 8vo. Cloth. Venice (Alfieri) 1961. Freitag 1731.

Altogether 147 issues, comprised of 7 early issues (Year I, Nos. 5 and 6, and Year II, Nos. 2, 3, 8, 21, and 23) and a large sequential run of 140 issues (Year III, No. 1 through Year XX, No. 139/140, lacking nos. 66 through 69) of the long-running Italian social, political, and cultural journal affiliated with the Movimento Comunità, an Italian socialist and liberal-democratic political party, under the editorial direction of Adriano Olivetti, Giorgio Soavi, and Renzo Zorzi, containing articles and essays on politics, sociology, literature, art, architecture, economics, urban planning, and other topics in Italy and abroad, with contributions from Olivetti, Gerardo Bruni, Vincenzo Mazzei, Mario Praz, Giuseppe Rovero, Alberto Moravia, Giulio Carlo Argan, Luciano Anceschi, Ignazio Silone, Giorgio Bassani, Cesare Pavese, Mario Luzi, Elio Vittorini, Carlo Bo, and many others. Profusely illustrated throughout with photographs and drawings. Early issues tabloid, later issues small 4to. 1946 and 1947… Read More

Torino: Tipografia Ceresole e Panizza, 1869. Octavo (22.8 x 15.8 cm). Presentation copy in original Romantic binding of white cardstock boards with pastoral scene within a gilt-framed cartouche to front cover and hand-colored portrait of a woman to back cover; 87 pp. plus 2 large folding plates. Some minor soiling and wear to covers, including some areas of wear along spine, signatures coming loose from binding in several places, overall about very good. Scientific thesis from graduate engineering student Galileo Ferraris (1847-1897) on telodynamic transmission, including numerous equations, with two large folding plates at the back containing many detailed scale drawings and mathematical figures. Ferraris went on to be a professor, physicist, and electrical engineer, as well as one of the pioneers of the AC power system and inventor of the induction motor. He worked at the Italian Industrial Institution, the first electrical engineering school of its kind in Italy, and in 1896 joined the Italian… Read More

257 pp. descriptive and critical catalogue, by Frida Schottmuller, of Spanish and Italian sculptures of the 15th through 18th centuries including pieces in marble, clay, ceramic, wood and stone, notes, indices, all works reproduced in the text. Last few pp. neatly repaired. Large 4to. Cloth. Berlin/Leipzig (De Gruyter) 1933. Second edition. (Bildwerke des Kaiser-Friedrich-Museums).

Bernini. 2 vols., 205, 23 pp. text on various aspects of the master's drawings, extensive scholarly notes, bibliography, concordances, indices, 198 fine plates showing preparatory works for sculptures, architectural sketches and plans, figure drawings, caricatures, etc. Large 4to. Cloth, spine of Vol. 2 slightly torn. Berlin (Heinrich Keller) 1931. (Romische Forschungen der Bibliotheca Hertziana, 9). The beautifully produced scholarly work has become increasingly scarce.

Unpaginated (26 leaves, some printed recto only, some printed recto and verso) catalogue printed on the occasion of the Festival of East-West Music organized by Fabio Sargentini at L'Attico in Rome, held June 3 through June 17, 1974, the catalogue consisting of black and white photographs of each of the participants, an interview with La Monte Young and Marian Zazeela by Shanta Serbjeet Singh, a brief essay by Daniel Caux on the music of La Monte Young and Terry Riley, an interview with Philip Glass by Willoughby Sharp and Liza Bear, brief essays by David Reck, a short autobiography of T.R. Mahalingam, and other brief notes, texts primarily in Italian and English. Small 4to. Original paper wrpps., spine slightly shaken, some very minor abrasions and soiling to covers. Rome (L'Attico) 1974. Participants of the festival cited on the title page of the catalogue were La Monte Young, Philip Glass, T.R. Mahalingam, Charlemagne Palestine, Pandit Pran Nath, T.N. Ramachandra Iyer, and Terry Riley. The… Read More

Piacenza: Stampa Gi-Bi, 1973. Octavo (21.3 x 15 cm). Original printed and illustrated side-stapled wrappers; 22 pp. Some light soiling and damp-staining to covers, overall about very good. Limited edition of 600 copies. Emilio Villa's "Flippant Ball-Feel" text was composed and published on the occasion of the "Flippers Chimeri" by Corrado Costa and William Xerra, exhibited in the contemporary gallery of the Mana Market Hall in Rome. Villa (1914-2003) was a poet, visual artist, art critic, and translator. A forerunner of the neo-avant-garde and a precursor to Gruppo 63, he spent time in Brazil in the 1950s and became involved with the Brazilian concrete poetry group before returning to Rome. A student of languages, Villa often wrote in a dialect of Milan rather than what he saw as the problematic and academic "Ytaglya" of the post-war period. He also often inserted words and phrases in ancient Greek, Provençal, French, and other languages into his poems, complicating his texts. His goal at times is… Read More

Rome: Movimento Futurista/A. Taveggia, n.d. (circa 1927). Quarto (29.3 x 23.2 cm). One double-sided sheet printed in red. Very slight yellowing, overall excellent. This single-page flyer or manifesto from the Futurist movement contains to one side an image of Giacomo Balla's "Il Pugno di Boccioni" surrounded by the motto "Marciare non marcire" and a text by F.T. Marinetti (1876-1944). This text begins: "Il Futurismo, religione di orgoglio italiano, velocità, originalità, eroismo, amore del pericolo, ottimismo artificiale, sport e forza muscolare, guerra, pugno-argomento, arte-vita, splendore geometrico, estetica della macchina, parole in libertà, dinamismo plastico, architettura pura, teatro sintetico simultaneo, vita simultanea, tattilismo, arte dei rumori, nacque nel febbraio 1909 a Milano e rinnovò il mondo." The reverse of the sheet contains the text "Ideologia del Futurismo e dei movimenti che ne derivano." Underneath a paragraph containing various ideologies associated with Futurism is a… Read More

78 pp. descriptive monograph on the Pinturicchio fresco cycle in the lavish 15th century Borgia Apartments, heavily annotated, lists, numerous text illus. (1 with color) after portraits, drawings, medals, signatures, etc., 133 fine plates (4 color, many in tones), bound out of order, showing maps, interior views, details of the frescos, etc. Folio. Brand-new professional cloth-covered boards. Some additional chipping, edgewear, minor toning and soiling. Rome (Danesi) 1897. One of 100 copies of the limited Italian edition. Ex-Pierpont Morgan library, bookplate would have been located on original front cover, acid burn from bookplate visible on flyleaf. 1897. Folio. 1/2 armorial gilt-tooled leather and bds. with wood veneer, rubbed and chipped. Rome (Danesi) 1897. One of 100 copies of the Italian edition. Freitag 9707.

Guido. XV, 121 pp. monograph on the 13th-century Sienese painter, his works and attributions, notes, bibliography, index, 128 illus. on plates. 4to. Cloth. d.j. Princeton (Princeton Univ. Press) 1964. Lucas p. 153. Freitag 5026. The work includes new information on Duccio and some of his contemporaries.

Gagini. 2 vols., 831, X, 507 pp. text, transcriptions of 366 documents, ext. notes, indices. 4to. Recent cloth. Palermo (Giornale di Sicilia) 1880-1884. This copy lacks the 38 plates called for. The rare and thorough text covers and documents a considerable part of the history of Renaissance sculpture in Sicily. The author is the renowned historiographer of Sicilian painting and sculpture, much of which was periodically destroyed in earthquakes and other catastrophes.

954 pp. volume on the "hidden treasures" of Rome, including a brief treatise on the 1600 Jubliee, its origins, and ceremonies, as well as chapters on the catacombs, the titles, deaconships, and bishoprics of cardinals, relics, and the stations, with a focus on the churches of Rome, indices. Not illustrated. Some very minor scattered staining and foxing, small loss to last page, missing final "Registro" page. 8vo. Old vellum, handwritten title to spine, some very minor soiling and staining. Rome (Luigi Zannetti) 1600. Rossetti 7781, Borroni 7984, Fossati Bellani 856, Kissner 987, Ranghiasci 517, Schudt 439, Sicari 256. Provenance: From the library of Sergio Rossetti. Ottavio Panciroli was a theologian who published this work to commemorate the 1600 Jubilee. In his "letter to readers" he states that this work was explicitly intended to counter the recently-published "Cose Meravigliose", expanded and revised by the Augustinian friar Santi Solinori. The most innovative and important feature of "I Tesori… Read More

730 pp. report on prisons and prison labor in early 20th century Italy, organized by type of intuition (youth reformatory, house of corrections, agricultural penal colony) and region, illustrated throughout with reproductions of photographs showing prison buildings, inmates, working conditions, and the produce of prison labor. Light foxing and page browning throughout. 4to. Recent-cloth backed boards. Rome (Tipografia delle Mantellate) 1923. A work that provides much rich documentation of prison conditions and inmate labor in early 20th century Italy. Extremely scarce in institutional collections. As of June 2015, WorldCat locates only one copy in North America.