Art & Architecture

Contact Alex Day or Andrea Mazzocchi

Art & Architecture encompasses a broad sweep of material, from early works concerning architecture and architectural history, and books and manuscripts on the fine arts and aesthetics, antiquities and archaeology, to pattern and design books, and private press books and fine bindings. The department also handles original artwork, artistic archives, posters, and propaganda material.

  1. HAMILTON, ‘Eliza’ [Elizabeth].

    Translation of the Letters of a Hindoo Rajah; written previous to, and during the Period of...

    London, J. Crowder for G. & J. Robinson, 1801.

    Second edition of Hamilton’s first separately published work, a pseudo-Oriental satire on British society, in a very well-preserved gilt paper binding imitating calf.

    £575

  2. HARRIS, James.

    Three Treatises the first concerning Art the second concerning music painting and poetry the third concerning happiness...

    London, John Nourse and Paul Vaillant, 1765.

    Presentation copies, inscribed ‘From the Author’, of the revised second editions of these two works on art and language by the philosopher and latterly politician James Harris.

    £600

  3. HELMAN, Isidore-Stanislas-Henri.

    Faits mémorables des empereurs de la Chine, tirés des annales Chinoises, dédiés à Madame,...

    Paris, chez l’auteur … et chez M. Ponce, [1788].

    Two handsome engraved works by the French engraver and printseller Helman (1743–1806/9), here on uncut sheets, the first depicting scenes from Chinese history, the second episodes in the life of Confucius (Kong Fuzi).

    £6000

  4. [HILLER, Johann Adam, editor].

    Anecdoten zur Lebensgeschichte berühmter französischer, deutscher, italienischer, holländischer...

    Leipzig, Lankisch, 1762.

    Scarce first edition of Hiller’s two-volume collection of literary, philosophical and historical anecdotes. The editor’s note at the end mentions the contemporary publication of a French work of similar inspiration, and states the editor’s intention to translate it and publish it as a sequel to...

    £175

  5. HOSSCHIUS, Sidronius.

    Sidronii Hosschii e Societate Iesu elegiarum libri sex. Praemittuntur illustrissimorum virorum poemata in...

    Antwerp, Balthasar Moretus ‘ex officina Plantiniana’, 1656.

    First collected edition of the neo-Latin verse of the Flemish Jesuit and poet Sidronius Hosschius (Sidron de Hossche, 1596–1653), edited after his death by his fellow poet Jacques van de Walle (1599–1690), and prefaced with poems on Hosschius’ death commissioned by the future Pope Alexander...

    £600

  6. HOWITT, William.

    The rural and domestic life of Germany: with characteristic sketches of its cities and scenery, collected in a...

    London, Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1842

    A fine copy of the first edition of Howitt’s account of his travels in Germany and Austria, and one of the best books in English about German life at the time. Howitt had moved with his family to Heidelberg in 1840 and stayed in Germany for more than two years on account of the education of his older...

    £100

  7. [HYMNAL.]

    Neu-vermehrt- und vollständiges Gesang-Buch, worinnen sowohl die Psalmen Davids, nach D. Ambrosii Lobwassers, Uebersetzung...

    [Likely Swabia, for] Philadelphia, Ernst Ludwig Baisch, 1774.

    First and only edition thus of this German hymnal, issued in Philadelphia by Ernst Ludwig Baisch under his own imprint but printed in Germany, bound by an itinerant German Pennsylvanian binder with printed waste from Charles Cist’s Americanische Stadt und Land Calender for 1797, with inscriptions...

    £3500

  8. JACOBSON, Ken.

    Odalisques & Arabesques: Orientalist Photography 1839–1925.

    [London], Quaritch, 2007.

    Profusely illustrated, this is the most comprehensive survey to date of nineteenth- and early twentieth-century photography of the Middle East and North Africa. Using Orientalist painting as a counterpoint, it primarily relates the extraordinarily rich visual documentation of the peoples and cultures...

    £60

  9. KECHT, Johann Sigismund.

    Der verbesserte praktische Weinbau in Gärten und vorzüglich auf Weinbergen … dritte, vermehrte, und...

    Berlin, [Trowitzsch and Son for] the author, 1823.

    Third, expanded edition (first 1813) of J.S. Kecht’s influential treatise describing his innovative methods of pruning grapevines to maximise harvest, first developed in his garden in Berlin and later praised by Goethe.

    £450

  10. LABORDE, Ernest.

    Vieilles maisons boutiques & paysages de Paris. Eaux fortes originales de Ernest Laborde. Presentées par Gustave...

    Paris, Jules Meynial, 1918 [1919].

    First edition, very rare: two series of twenty etchings each on the most picturesque houses and shops in Paris, produced between 1911 and 1918 by Ernest Laborde (1870–1935).

    £1950

  11. [LABOURS OF THE MONTHS &c.] 

    Januarius.  Februarius.  Merz.  April … 

    Nuremberg, Joh. Andreae Endterische Handlung, [second half of eighteenth century]. 

    A scarce popular print depicting the labours of the months and signs of the zodiac, four continents, the four classical elements, and the four seasons. 

    £475

  12. LA SERRE, Jean-Puget de.

    Grab-Statt der weltlichen Ergötzlichkeiten, einstens in Französischer Sprache zubereitet … anjetzt...

    Regensburg, Johann Conrad Peetz und Bader, 1738.

    First edition in German of Tombeau des délices du monde, by the French dramatist and historian Jean-Puget de la Serre (1594–1665).

    £375

  13. LEWIS, Wyndham.

    The Caliph’s Design. Architects! Where is your Vortex?

    London, The Egoist Ltd., 1919.

    First edition, a pamphlet of art criticism, particularly an attack on ugly modern architecture; there is (rare) praise for Cézanne and Picasso.

    £400

  14. LEWIS, Wyndham.

    Wyndham Lewis the Artist.

    From ‘Blast’ to Burlington House’ … London, Laidlaw & Laidlaw, [1939].

    First edition, first issue.

    £125

  15. [LEWIS, Wyndham.]

    Agenda. Wyndham Lewis Special Issue.

    [London, Poets and Painters Press (William Cookson), 1969.]

    A triple issue of Agenda devoted to Wyndham Lewis. Bridson’s article, ‘The making of The Human Age’ appears on pp. 163-171, and mentions his own inscribed copy of the work; also included are the talk commissioned from I.A. Richards before the broadcast of The Childermass,...

    £75

  16. LIVY; [Pedro DE LA VEGA, translator].

    Todas las decadas de Tito Livio paduano, que hasta al presente se hallaron y fueron...

    [(Colophon:) Cologne [i.e. Antwerp?], Arnold Birckmann], 1553.

    A handsome copy of Livy’s History in Spanish, containing the surviving books as well as Florus’s Epitome, in a contemporary Augsburg binding produced by a bindery in the service of the Fugger family.

    £3500

  17. [LOUIS XIV.]

    L’oraison funebre de tres-haute, tres-excellente et tres-puissante princesse monarchie universelle. Prononcée le...

    ‘Cologne’, s.n., ‘1705’ [1704].

    Sole edition, very rare and virtually unstudied, of ‘one of the most curious and violent pamphlets published against Louis XIV’ (Pelissier, trans.).

    £1250

  18. MACDIARMID, Hugh.

    Poems to Paintings by William Johnstone 1933 …

    Edinburgh, K.D. Duval, [1963].

    First edition.

    £25

  19. MÄNDL, Kaspar.

    Christliche Sitten-Lehr und heylsame Anmuthungen gezogen auß Betrachtung deß bitteren Leyden und Sterbens unsers...

    Augsburg, Matthias Wolff, 1737.

    A superb example of Rococo decorative binding, exploiting all available materials – silks, metals, beads, papers, gilding, and leather – to extraordinary (if perhaps excessive) effect.

    £6750

  20. MARLBOROUGH, John Churchill, Duke of.

    Document, signed ‘Marlborough’, appointing a gunner at the Canadian settlement...

    [London,] Office of Ordnance, 24 December 1714.

    A commission appointing the intended recipient (never filled in) ‘to be one of the Gunners belonging to his Ma.ties Guarrison of Annapolis Royall, you are therefore Carefully and Diligently to Discharge the Duty of a Gunner in the said service by doing performing all manner of things thereunto belonging...

    £950