LES JOLIES VALLÉES DE L'ILE DE FRANCE

Paris: Les Bibliophiles Franco-Suisses, 1944. No. 98 OF 112 COPIES, this one printed for Georges Wendling. 333 x 258 mm. (13 1/8 x 10 1/8"). 2 p.l., vii, [1], 148, [6] pp.Preface by Georges Duhamel.
GRACEFUL ECRU MOROCCO BY CREUZEVAULT (stamp-signed on front turn-in) covers tooled with fern fronds in gilt, black, and ochre, smooth spine with gilt lettering, fawn-colored suede pastedowns and flyleaves, the pastedowns framed by black and ecru morocco, all edges gilt. Original wrappers bound in. Housed in a leather-lined wood veneer chemise trimmed with brown morocco, in a suede-lined morocco-lipped wood slipcase. With 43 illustrations by André Planson, nine of them full-page, all engraved on wood by Paul Baudier and printed in color. This copy with an additional suite of the illustrations printed on chine, and WITH TWO ORIGINAL WATERCOLORS. With a two-leaf announcement of the bibliophile society's meeting on 11 November 1944, illustrated with one of the prints from this work, bound in. Spine slightly darkened towards light tan, faint offsetting from woodcuts, one plate from the additional suite a bit foxed, IN VERY FINE CONDITION--but a fine copy, clean, fresh, and bright internally, in an unworn binding.

This folio-sized appreciation of the "pretty valleys" of the north-central Ile de France region around Paris was illustrated by one of the Painters of Poetic Reality, and bound to a most appealing--and entirely appropriate--tranquil, leafy design by a leading craftsman. Literary critic, poet, and essayist Edmond Pilon (1874-1945) provides the descriptive text here, while painter André Planson (1898-1981) brings the bucolic views to life in soothing printed watercolors, along with two watercolor originals. Planson was one of eight artists dubbed "les peintres de la réalité poétique" by a journalist in 1935, for their poetic use of color. Influenced by Cezanne and Matisse, Planson received the Blumenthal Prize in 1933 and was elected to the Academy of Fine Arts in 1960. Henri Creuzevault (1905-71), with his father Louis-Lazare (1879-1956), made the family bindery one of the most famous workshops in Paris during the first half of the 20th century. In the words of Duncan & De Bartha, the father "blended an appealing but anonymous classicism with Marius-Michel's doctrines," while the son "established himself as a contender to Adler and Bonet in the vanguard of the modernist movement in French bookbinding." Henri established his own workshop on the venerable Faubourg-Saint-Honoré in 1937, and there, Flety tells us, "he produced his most remarkable bindings, which earned him a place among the best decorators of the period 1940-60." For our binding, Creuzevault has used the delicately tooled fronds of ferns, subdued neutral colors, and even the wooden chemise and slipcase to evoke the pleasures of nature and the serenity of a pastoral landscape. The library of French bibliophile Georges Wendling was rich in fine editions in fine bindings, particularly those of the late 19th and early 20th century. A fastidious collector, he was careful to select only books to be found in outstanding condition..