bookplates – Page 2 – { feuilleton }

The art of Edmond van Offel, 1871–1959

Edmond van Offel was a Belgian artist who Philippe Jullian features in two of his books about Symbolist art but whose work I’d not seen anywhere else—at least until now. All the pictures here are from a collection published in Paris in 1902 which may be the one Jullian used for his selections. The book contains both Jullian drawings together with a great deal of other work comprising illustrations, vignettes, bookplates and also some of the artist’s writings. Offel’s combination of detailed line-work and attenuated figures is reminiscent of Charles Ricketts who may have been an influence.

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Erotic bookplates

Art by and for the library of Aangel Mendez (1950).

Only the first example here is overtly erotic but the one below is tagged as such on this site which displays a huge variety of bookplate designs. There’s more to be found in the Ex Eroticis Libris, Erotica, and Nude sections. Pretty much everything there is heterosexual, of course; homoerotic bookplates from the earlier decades of the 20th century are scarce for obvious reasons but naked males, equivocal or not, can always be found. (Via Things Magazine.)

Art by Heino Beddig (1966).

Art by and for the library of Haagen Bartam-Jensen (no date).

Previously on { feuilleton }
• Koloman Moser bookplates
• Erotic bookplates by Franz von Bayros
• German bookplates
• Troutsdale Press bookplates
• Bookplates from The Studio
• Yuri Yakovenko bookplates
• Tranquillo Marangoni bookplates
• Book-plates of To-day
• Louis Rhead bookplates
• Pratt Libraries Ex Libris Collection
• The Evil Orchid Bookplate Contest
• The art of Oleg Denysenko
• David Becket’s bookplates

The art of Sidney Hunt, 1896–1940

Ganymede Before Zeus (1921).

Another of those artists about whom detail remains tantalisingly remote if the web is your primary research tool. Hunt was a British Modernist who also edited an avant-garde magazine, Ray, from 1926–27. Most of the works here are bookplates from around 1923, many of them distinctly homoerotic which adds to their interest. The note at Wikipedia is unsourced but tells us that his output included “experimental prose-poem fantasies of 18-year-old hermaphrodites”. Maybe these, and more of his work, will turn up eventually.

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Koloman Moser bookplates

Ex libris Fritz Waerndorfer (1903).

I could happily post things by the indefatigable Koloman Moser (1868–1918) all the time but he’s not exactly an unknown figure even if his work does get overshadowed by his colleague in the Vienna Secession, Gustav Klimt. This handful of ex libris plates almost all date from the Secession period, and include one for Adele Bloch-Bauer, a woman whose name is familiar these days for her being the subject of a very well-known Klimt portrait.

Ex libris Fritz Schwartz (1900).

Ex libris Rudolf Steindl (1900).

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Weekend links 107

Le Faune (1923) by Carlos Schwabe.

• “When I recently attended a conference in China, many of the presenters left their papers on the cloud—Google Docs, to be specific. You know how this story ends: they got to China and there was no Google. Shit out of luck. Their cloud-based Gmail was also unavailable, as were the cloud lockers on which they had stored their rich media presentations.” Ubuweb’s Kenneth Goldsmith on why he doesn’t trust the Cloud.

• “I’m a poet and Britain is not a land for poets anymore.” A marvellous interview with the great Lindsay Kemp at Dangerous Minds. Subjects include all that you’d hope for: Genet, Salomé, David Bowie, Ken Russell, Derek Jarman, The Wicker Man and “papier maché giant cocks”.

• “As early as the 1950s, Maurice Richardson wrote a Freudian analysis which concluded that Dracula was ‘a kind of incestuous-necrophilious, oral-anal-sadistic all-in wrestling match’.” Christopher Frayling on the Bram Stoker centenary.

• Björk gets enthused by (among other things) Leonora Carrington, The Hourglass Sanatorium and Alejandro Jodorowsky’s YouTube lectures.

• Before Fritz Lang’s Metropolis there was Algol – Tragödie der Macht (1920). Strange Flowers investigates.

David Marsh recreates famous album covers using Adobe Illustrator’s Pantone swatches.

• New titles forthcoming from Strange Attractor Press. Related: an interview with SAP allies Cyclobe.

• 960 individual slabs of vinyl make an animated waveform for Benga’s I Will Never Change.

• An exhibition of works by Stanislav Szukalksi at Varnish Fine Art, San Francisco,

• Keith Haring‘s erotic mural for the NYC LGBT Community Center is restored.

• The Situationist Times (1962–1967) is resurrected at Boo-Hooray.

• Doors Closing Slowly: Derek Raymond‘s Factory Novels.

• Will Wilkinson insists that fiction isn’t good for you.

• More bookplates at BibliOdyssey and 50 Watts.

• The Top 25 Psychedelic Videos of All Time.

• Flannery O’Connor: cartoonist.

• RIP Adam Yauch.

• Their finest moment: Sabotage (1994) by Beastie Boys.