A journal by artist and designer John Coulthart.
Pages from Physica Curiosa (1697) by Gaspar Schott, a collection of natural anomalies and the usual debatable creatures which belong in a fantastic bestiary. Some of these are similar to illustrations from the same period which I’ve used in Ann & Jeff VanderMeer’s Kosher Guide to Imaginary Animals, due for publication soon by Tachyon.
Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
• The etching and engraving archive
It’s that man again… Following on the heels of the occult-themed Strange Attractor Salon (which is running events throughout this month, it should be noted; tickets here), the Sprüth Magers gallery, London, has a Kenneth Anger exhibition opening on February 19th based around Anger’s delirious short film Invocation of My Demon Brother (1969) and his scurrilous anthology of movie tragedy and gossip, Hollywood Babylon. Anger himself presents a showing of his films on the same day at Tate Modern.
Previously on { feuilleton }
• Arabesque for Kenneth Anger by Marie Menken
• Strange Attractor Salon
• Edmund Teske
• Kenneth Anger on DVD again
• Mouse Heaven by Kenneth Anger
• The Man We Want to Hang by Kenneth Anger
• Relighting the Magick Lantern
• Kenneth Anger on DVD…finally
Alfred Roller (1901 & 02).
A selection of posters for the Vienna Secession at Lawrence University’s Art of the Poster site. Alfred Roller’s stylised lettering on the poster below was famously adapted by Wes Wilson for his psychedelic designs in the 1960s.
left: Koloman Moser (1902); right: Alfred Roller (1903).
Previously on { feuilleton }
• The art of Henri Privat-Livemont, 1861–1936
• Wilhelm Kåge
• Art Nouveau illustration
Bellgrove, young Titus and Barquentine by Mervyn Peake. Case designed by Robert Hollingsworth.
I’d thought about posting the covers of my boxed set of Gormenghast paperbacks a couple of years back when there was a flurry of blogospheric attention being given to Penguin cover designs…thought about it then never got round to it. The reason for doing so now is twofold: firstly I’ve been re-reading the books, and secondly some Gormenghast-related news emerged this week which gives this post an additional relevance.
Fuchsia by Mervyn Peake.
The set of Peake paperbacks which Penguin published in 1968 (and their subsequent reprints) were the first editions of Peake’s trilogy which I encountered so I can’t help but regard them as the ones, the only copies I could countenance reading. That may change, however (see below). I’ve no idea how scarce the boxed edition is but the books are reprintings from 1970 so I presume Penguin put out a boxed gift set to make the most of Peake’s posthumous success. I always liked the presentation which is the standard Penguin Modern Classics format of the period, it leaves to you how much you want to regard the books as works of fantasy or simply novels of a rather grotesque and highly imaginative reality. Titus Groan‘s sketch of a glowering and thoroughly unglamorous Fuchsia was a daring choice for a cover intended to lure a newer, younger audience to Peake’s work. The drawing says a great deal about the author’s unsentimental attitude towards his creations; compared to the florid and often delicate covers of the fantasy books being published by Ballantine in the late Sixties (a series which included the Gormenghast trilogy), it seems shockingly unpleasant.