House Hunting

I get lots of requests from clients looking for old prints of their houses. We’re talking old houses natch, with considerable local history, connections to a good family name, and perhaps of some architectural significance. These are usually not houses of national, or international, renown. The lodge or gatehouse, but not the big house up the drive. You know what I mean.

These seekers often have to be very patient, sometimes not hearing from me for years, and I can empathize. For 15 years I have been on a personal quest for historical images of my parents’ house in Lincolnshire.

1820s hand-coloured engraving of Aslackby, Lincolnshire

My search has been frustrating at times – located in a part of the country not overly blessed with lavishly-illustrated county histories, the house has a somewhat obscure provenance and is not associated with any famous past residents, or great historical occasions.

I have heard tantalising tales of an engraved illustration in this or that book, maybe by one of the Buck brothers (Samuel and Nathaniel, prolific topographical draughtsmen in the eighteenth century), maybe by someone else. The closest geographically I have come so far in terms of old prints is a small c.1820s engraving of a neighbouring village, and two more substantial views of the nearest market town.

A fellow Ephemera Society member was kind enough to let me scan this postcard of my parents’ village – featuring the very house in the upper right corner. (He doesn’t want to sell.) He tells me he’s seen with his own eyes a postcard that is a full-size photo of the house alone. Wow.  Privately published, presumably in a very small print run, at the height of the postcard boom of the early 1900s. I could flick through the ‘Lincolnshire’ section of every stand at every postcard fair for the rest of my life and not come across it. Doesn’t quite seem worth it.

c.1910 photographic postcard of Dowsby, Lincolnshire

He did sell me a c.1910 handwritten bill from a local printer to a prominent former owner of the house, which is a nice little connection.

I was once very excited to see sale particulars of an early 20th century auction of the house offered very cheaply online – complete with interesting photographs and estate map – but was told the item had been sold a few days earlier and not removed from the website. Frustrated again.

I enjoy browsing old family scrap albums, all the rage in Victorian times, which can reveal very personal insights into the lives and times of their compilers, and the places in which they lived. What are the chances…?  Amateur watercolours from the 18th and 19th centuries vividly record not only architecture and topography, but can contain incidental details that have acquired considerable interest in their own right – for example fashions in dress or interior decoration. These drawings are often found in a diary or sketch book, often the work of a young lady of the house, and often very finely executed – wealthy families could afford to employ quality drawing masters.

I live in hope, dear reader.

“See you at Chelsea”

I will be exhibiting for the first time at The Chelsea Antiquarian Book Fair, held on November 6th – 7th at the stunning Chelsea Old Town Hall in the King’s Road, London SW3 5EE.

The Chelsea fair has become a fixture in the calendar for book and print collectors and dealers from Britain, Europe and America. Warmer than Boston, more intimate than York, less formal than Paris – Chelsea has it all. Customers return year after year to this lively and friendly event.

‘See you at Chelsea’ has become a phrase familiar to everyone in the British rare book and works on paper trade.

I look forward to meeting old friends, established clients and especially new collectors.  With Christmas around the corner, are you looking for an unusual and memorable present? Or is there a subject, artist, genre or period of history that especially attracts you?  Perhaps you are thinking of collecting books or prints but are unsure of where to start, what to look for, who to approach or what on earth I mean by half calf gilt, aquatint, or slightly foxed…

If so, come and talk to me on the Stage at the back of the Main Hall (Stand 87, you can’t miss it!).

Whether you are in the business, a collector or simply curious about rare, antiquarian and collectable books, prints, maps and ephemera, then the Chelsea Antiquarian Book Fair is not to be missed.

The Fair is Open on Friday 6th November 2pm to 7pm and Saturday 7th November 11am to 5pm.

To Find out More:  http://www.chelseabookfair.com/

For Free Tickets please click this link:  http://www.chelseabookfair.com/register-for-tickets/9e2ec72ab6aeb74beab8efce48491cbb

For a Preview of some of the Stock I will be bringing to Chelsea:  https://jenningsprints-public.sharepoint.com/SiteAssets/Bristol%20BF.pdf

People, Prints and Progress – Or, Why are Prints Important?

Though relatively scant scholarly attention has been paid to the subject, I would go so far as to suggest that the printed image is at least as important as the printed word to the progress of Western civilisation. The major scientific and technological advances of the post-Medieval world would surely have been impossible without what William M. Ivins called the “exactly repeatable pictorial statement”.

Read more of my article for the Antiquarian Booksellers’ Association (ABA) website.

Link: http://www.aba.org.uk/Book-Collecting-Details.aspx?bcid=102

Backing Beck

One of the strongest growth areas of map collecting is London transport, and in particular the diagrammatic maps designed for London Underground by Harry Beck (1902-1974).

Cartographically-speaking, they were revolutionary.  Prior to the Beck diagram, the various underground lines were superimposed geographically over a simplified road map.

I bought one of his handy pocket-sized tri-fold designs, published in 1959, from Jonathan Potter Ltd recently. It is I believe the penultimate Beck-designed tube map (correct me if you know better).

1959 Beck Underground map

The first issue of Beck’s iconic map, still so familiar and upon which the current map is still based, was published in January 1933.  The ‘electrical circuit’ design dispensed with conventions of scale, accurate bearing and all surface landmarks – apart from the dear old River Thames, whose sinous, stylized curves flow through the lower portion.

2nd edition of the Beck pocket map issued February 1933. Special version for the opening of Southgate and Enfield West stations. Sold recently for £900 at auction.

Beck’s freelance updates were ignored by London Underground after 1960 – sparking a bitter legal tussle. Indeed, his 29-page personal scrapbook, which came up for auction in June, includes a rejection letter from London Transport.

Personal scrapbook of Harry Beck, sold recently at auction for £5,000

The various editions of Beck’s map not only chart the expanding, ever-developing city that is London.  They reflect the changing priorities of Londoners and tourists, and the evolving stylistic tastes of pre- and post-war Britain.

My advice: next time you visit a collectors fair or flea market, ferret right down to the bottom of that box of maps.

Fake or Fortune?

Last week I gave a talk at Colet Court, the preparatory school of St Paul’s.

I encouraged the boys to take a closer look at the pictures, maps, family scrap albums and illustrated books in their homes.  Most people have got an old print somewhere, perhaps gathering dust in the attic, even if they don’t know it.

I gave the schoolboys some pointers to help identify a genuine antique print, and reproduce them here in the hope that you too, dear reader, might unearth a hidden gem.

Let me know if you come up with any interesting finds. Email a pic here: jasper@jenningsprints.com

Happy hunting!

• Signatures:  for an artist to sign a print was rare until the late 19th century, and they also often signed reproductions. Instead, look for Latin terms engraved or etched under the image to denote artist, draughtsman, printmaker, sometimes printer and publisher – in Britain this served as copyright.

• Plate mark:  can you see an indented line around the outer edge of the image?

• Paper:  does it look bright and new or has it dulled or browned with age? Can you see any rust-coloured spots (known as ‘foxing’)?
  Hold the paper close to a light: can you see the pattern of vertical lines (‘wire-marks’) crossed by horizontal ‘chain-lines’ from the wires in the papermaker’s tray.  This is evidence of ‘laid paper’, widely used in the 18th century before ‘wove’ papers took over, which have no such marks visible. European papers can be approximately dated from their appearance and feel, and often provide evidence of a modern reprint or facsimile.

• The Image:  look closely with a magnifying glass: is it made up of a mesh of tiny dots? If so it may be a photomechanical reproduction.

• Other Clues:  if the print is framed, is it an old frame and mount, perhaps with the original framer’s or printseller’s label on the backboard?

Furniture prints

This post is loosely inspired by an Italian trompe l’oeil table top convincingly decorated with scattered papers, including four topographical/architectural engravings. It is for sale by auction at Adam’s of Dublin on 12th October.

By the time this table was finished, in 1832, enthusiasm for applying real prints directly to furniture was perhaps waning.  During the 18th century however, engravings, etchings and woodcuts of all kinds were essential to the decoration of the homes and furniture of rich and poor alike.

Most pictures back then were not framed behind glass for display on a wall. That is a relatively recent preoccupation.

Almost any household item might be decorated with (paper) prints; they were pasted to screens and cabinets in particular, as well as to tables and painted furniture, also to smaller pieces like tea caddies and boxes (inside and out).  They were then usually varnished.

An insight into the mindset of his customers is provided by print publisher Robert Sayer in his 1775 trade catalogue.  He puffs his prints as “elegant and genteel Ornaments when framed and Glazed” but offers an alternative: “…may be fitted up in a cheaper Manner, to ornament Rooms, Staircases, &c. with curious borders representing frames, a fashion much in use, and produces very agreeable effect”.

So it is clear that those prints intended primarily for decoration – the so-called ‘furniture prints’ – might be displayed in a variety of ways.

At the time Sayer issued his catalogue entire walls and whole rooms, known as ‘print rooms’, were covered with prints applied directly; often themed by subject or genre, sometimes without gaps, they produced the effect of wallpaper.

With framing and glazing an expensive business and a luxury of the elite, printed decorative borders were produced in large quantities expressly for surrounding images in the manner of real frames.

These borders were often published within pattern books or as part of sets of what were commonly called ‘ornament prints’.  These were ostensibly designs for use in the applied arts – be it pottery, furniture, metalwork, embroidery or whatever – but were very often cut up and used to decorate furniture themselves.

From my own collection a modest contribution to this theme of decorating objects with paper prints (above).  This small decorative clasp(?) is inset with a military scene I have not yet identified, presumably a fragment of a larger composition.