Focillon, Henri
Le Mont Dans la Ville
Paris, France, Chez l'Artiste, 1928. First Edition. Softcover. Size: 4to 11" - 13" tall. A beautiful, evocative celebration of the Sainte-Geneviève mountain in the French alps. A magnificent copy in softcover format from the pen of Henri Focillon (1881-1943) and lithography studio of Georges Gobo (1876-1958), a.k.a. Georges Gobeaux. Henri Focillon was a French art historian, son of the printmaker Victor-Louis Focillon, and eventually the Director of the Musee des Beaux-Arts in Lyon, a Professor of Art History at various colleges and universities and including the United States, where he went into exile and taught at Yale University. Mentor to George Kubler, a renowned poet in his own right, and an expert in medieval art. Presented in the original publisher's printed cardboard wraps (protected further in glassine wraps), then folded into a cardboard chemise decorated in blue decorated paper, in neat, crisply creased gatefold, measuring 11 1/4" x 9" tall and wide, then housed in a similarly decorated cardboard slipcase, quite sturdily and attractively, measuring 11 3/4" x 9 1/2" tall and wide, respectively. Slight peeling away of paper on slipcase bottom, some rubbing to its fore-edges, else about Near Fine. Four original lithographs measuring 9" wide by 11 1/4" tall. Only 257 numbered copies printed on a fine Arches paper format, held loose as issued, and this is Exemplaire No. 107, signed and numbered by Gobo in the same hand as the letter (see below). This iteration is "Deux cents exemplaires sur papier velin D'Arches Fabrique Specialement, Numerotes de 36 a 235." Printed by the publisher for B.J. Van Gelder, as this publication was issued and sold by subscription. Typographie done by Les Presses de Ducros et Colas, and the lithographies were pulled by A. Bras for E. Desjobert. Some scattered foxing here and there in the folded leaves, two leaves each being folded and then folded together in loose, two-leaf signatures. Original lithographs in duotone in a folder. Forty-seven lithographies originales de Georges Gobo, one at frontis, six hors-texte et 40 in-texte. Laid in is a four-page letter in pen from G. Gobo to "Mon chers Druis" (sp. ?), seemingly written 30 years later ("5 juin 58") and suffuse with medical news about an E.K.G., heart troubles, bronchitis, and other maladies. Modern proof printed from the original plate of the Chalcographie du Louvre, as stated at the page of limitation. Two title pages, lithograph at frontis, tissue-protected. 194 [1] pp., then a separate table of chapter titles, then another of a list of illustrations, complete 21 Decembre, 1928. Georges Gobo/Gobeaux was known well and respected for his painting, sculpture, lithography, etching, and illustrating over several decades in both France and the U.S. (mostly California, where he was born in 1876). His father, of Charente origin, had come to the United States to make a fortune, but when he died in 1882, his family returned to France to settle in Angouleme. Young George apprenticed as a lithographer in Angouleme then moved in 1900 to Angers, joined a professional society of artists and then exhibited solo in 1900. The web-site devoted to his art and life notes that he made his first etching on zinc plates, exhibited his engravings first in 1908, then moved in 1911 to Paris and eventually traveled to and lived and worked in Belgium, Netherlands, Italy, Germany, Spain, the U.S. and Morocco.Member, I.O.B.A., C.B.A., and adherent to the highest ethical standards. . Signed by Illustrator. . Near Fine
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USD 395.00 [Appr.: EURO 368 | £UK 311 | JP¥ 62452]
Keywords: Georges Gobeaux French language French alps mountain village French culture lithography signed letter Georges Gobo Henri Focillon