Themes in Aquatint

San Francisco: CA: Book Club of California, 1978. First Edition. Hardcover. Very Good/Very Good. Series: Book Club of California Publication, No. 160. LIMITED EDITION of 500 copies printed at the Cambridge University Press with color plates printed at the Curwen Press, London, typographical design by John Dreyfus. Folio. 14 3/4 x 9 3/4 inches. (viii), (104) pp. 16 color plates including the frontispiece, chapter heads within decorative borders, index; text clean, un-marked. Quarter red cloth, specially commissioned Cockerell marbled paper over boards, gilt-titled spine, plain paper dust-jacket; binding square and tight, dust-jacket toned, jacket soiled, and freckled, now nicely preserved in archival mylar. Original prospectus laid-in. KJ319-160. A Fine copy in a Very Good jacket. This is first book produced entirely in England for the Book Club of California. Aquatint began in the last quarter of the eighteenth century and flourished for about six decades before giving way to lithography. Aquatint imitates water-color drawing and is perhaps the most beautiful form of book illustration. This book is the first treatment of the books that contain aquatint illustrations as a form of literature. Colin Franklin is an English writer, bibliographer, book-collector and antiquarian bookseller. As a bookseller, Franklin specialized in private presses and the book-arts, and has written on Shakespeare, Japanese books and prints, Elizabeth Barrett Browning as well as printing techniques and media. REFERENCE: Harlan, The Two Hundredth Book, No. 160. (Inventory #: KJ319-160)