The Three Admirable Accidents of Andrea de Piero. From the First Englyshed Edition of the Decameron of John Boccaccio with Woodcuts by Fritz Kredel
1954MM319-055Lexington KY: Gravesend Press 1954. First Edition thus. Hardcover. Very Good. Fritz Kredel. LIMITED EDITION of 200 hand-numbered copies; this is copy 58 printed from handset Caslon type on hand-made Fabriano paper. 12mo. 7 5/16 x 4 1/8 inches. vi 48 2 pp. Half-title title page in red black and blue inks decorative initials throughout some in color 6 woodcut illustrations throughout including the woodcut on the colophon also laid-in is a woodcut illustration on a small French-fold sheet which is a proof of the original illustration Fritz Kredel cut for page 4 but ultimately replaced with the illustration on page 4 that Kredel liked better; text clean unmarked. Quarter parchment spine decorated patterned paper in red and green over boards spine titled in gilt; binding square and tight light toning to extremities of covers. Red dot label on front free end-paper with penciled price book seller notations in pencil on front end-papers. MM319-055. Very Good. The text of this volume is a "story of roguery in the fourteenth-century" excerpted from Boccaccio's Decameron. It features lovely woodcut illustrations in late-medieval style by Fritz Kredel 1900-1973 a German-American artist and graphic designer; Kredel created the presidential seal for John F. Kennedy's inauguration. Joseph Graves the proprietor of the Gravesend Press was a clothing merchant vice-president and treasurer of Graves Cox & Co. who was also a book collector with an interest in printing and book illustration before he began his printing efforts. In 1948 Graves taught a course on the history of printing and book illustration at Transylvania University. It was about this time that the Gravesend Press was founded. The Gravesend press mark on the colophon of this book shows Patience the Graves' pet donkey and the "Sleeping Pressman" cut by Fritz Kredel the first use of this press mark. The pressmark contains the motto in Spanish âQue hermosa es no hacer nada y luego descansar." "Fortunate is he who can rest after having done nothing." REFERENCE: H. Richard Archer "Joseph Graves and The Press of Gravesend" The Kentucky Review Vol. 7 No. 1 Spring 1987. Gravesend Press hardcover books
John Howell for Books · États-Unis175,00 $US≈ 148,07 €
