#arnold fawcus

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Marbled Monday

This week's Marbled Monday post is A Study of the Illuminated Books of William Blake: Poet, Printer, and Prophet. It was written by British surgeon and author Geoffrey Keynes and published by the Trianon Press in 1964. The Trianon Press was a Paris-based publisher of fine art books founded in 1947 by Arnold Fawcus. The book includes an essay on Blake's illuminated books and reproductions of some of his illustrations. They are printed on paper specially made to reproduce the tint of the paper used by Blake.

The slipcase and binding are covered in the same marbled paper—a red field with green, chartreuse, and lighter red veining. The book is quarter-bound in brown Morocco leather and features the title gold-stamped on the spine and a gold-tooled line where the leather and marbled paper meet on the front and back covers. It is signed by Geoffrey Keynes.

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-- Alice, Special Collections Department Manager

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Pesach Greetings!

For Passover 2022, we present some pages from a Haggadah with illustrations by the  Lithuanian-born American graphic artist Ben Shahn (1898-1969) published in Boston by Little, Brown and Co. in 1965. Shahn originally created eleven of the twelve full-page color plates for this Haggadah over the course of six months circa 1930. The illustrations, like those executed for his secular works, highlight the struggle against oppression, a theme central to the story of Passover. The figures depicted were modeled after the Jews of Djerba, whom Shahn had encountered during a year-long journey through North Africa.

After an unsuccessful attempt to print the Haggadah in color, Shahn sold the plates which eventually entered the collection of The Jewish Museum in New York. Nevertheless, in 1958 Shahn met Arnold Fawcus, proprietor of the Paris-based fine-press facsimile publisher Trianon Press, and the two agreed to seeing the Haggadah project through to completion. Shahn produced a twelfth illustration, added ten drawings for the scenes of the popular children’s Passover song Had Gadya (An Only Kid), and designed a frontispiece and title page, while Fawcus commissioned British scholar Cecil Roth to compose an introduction and notes, and reuse Roth’s own 1934 translation of the Haggadah text. The Trianon Press production was produced as a deluxe limited edition of 228 copies signed by Shahn. Our Little, Brown copy is a trade edition of the Trianon production, and is a monument to the skill of one of the twentieth century’s most famous Jewish artists.

Sameach Pesach!

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It’s Fine Press Friday! 

This week we bring you Ecclesiastes, or The Preacher, copied and illustrated by by American artist and printmaker Ben Shahn, published in 1967 by The Trianon Press in Paris, France, in a limited edition of 240 copies.

The Trianon Press specializes in fine art books, many of which take the form of facsimiles. Trianon’s first published book, Les Baigneuses (1947), was made for the Louvre Museum and included facsimiles of Paul Cezanne’s works created with a combination of Collotype and Pochoir techniques developed by French artist Daniel Jacomet. Notably, The Trianon Press produced facsimiles of 26 of William Blake’s illuminated books and prints, of which we hold 22.

In this book, Ben Shahn’s handwriting and illustrations are made in facsimile with collotype and hand stenciling. The edition was produced under the supervision of Shahn and the founder of The Trianon Press, Arnold Fawcus. The workshop Imprimerie Mourlot printed the lithographs and MM. Hourdebaigt and Crampe produced the collotype and stencil. The gold lettering and accents were reproduced in serigraphy by Thierry, Paris. The letterpress at the end of the book was set by Imprimerie La Ruche, Paris, with a goatskin binding was by Engel, Malakoff and a slip-case made by Adine, Paris. Only by dividing the labor are such large and fine editions possible. 

Ben Shahn was, for a time, a Farm Security Administration photographer. He used his photos to advocate for economic and social reform as well as inspiration for some of the images in this book, such as Wheat Field- Ecclesiastes (1967). Ben Shahn attributes his commitment to art to the Old Testament and the references made to it in his youth by family and the elders in his Jewish home town. One verse spoke to him in particular: “Wherefore I perceive that there is nothing better, than that a man should rejoice in his own works; for that is his portion….” (Ecclesiastes 3:22). 

Our copy, a gift from our friend Jerry Buff, includes an original lithographic drawing signed in pencil by the artist.

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--Teddy, Special Collections Graduate Intern