Exhibition - Toyama 1936. [Toyamashi Shusai Nichiman Sangyo Daihakurankai Kyosankai Shi]. Toyama 1938 (Showa 13). 23x16cm publisher's cloth and card box; numerous photo illustrations, colour plates, folding plans and elevations. A nice copy. Au$650

The official report on the 1936 Japan-Manchuria Great Industrial Exhibition. Though blemished by too many portraits of personages, this is still an excellent record of thirties Japanese expo architecture and design with coloured pictures of posters, advertising, tickets and so on, plans and elevations of buildings, lighting, and photo views. There is also the obligatory Hatsusaburo colour folding birds-eye panorama.
Worldcat finds two copies outside Japan, both in California.

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Shop signs. [Shin Kanban Zuan Kosakushu]. Tokyo, Seibundo Shinkosha 1938 (Showa 13). 26x19cm publisher's cloth (small chip from the spine) and printed card slipcase; 194pp, numerous b/w line drawings and photo illustrations, 17 colour and another eight plates printed in green. Au$400

Second printing or issue? This appeared the year before as a special number of the journal Kokoku Kai - advertising world. A collection of new advertising and shop signs which is both a treasury of existing signs - most Japanese with a selection from Europe - and offers design suggestions and practical tips. There's a few I want, the giant ear with a phonograph implant high on the list.
Worldcat finds no copies.

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Sugiura Hisui, Takeo Takei, Takeshi Kimata &c. [Wagako no Rekishi]. Osaka, Mitsokushi [1939] (Showa 14). 27x19cm publisher's cloth backed boards decorated in gilt and black in mildy worn decorated box; 84pp illustrated in colour throughout by Takei and others; cover design by Sigiura. Partly filled in with pencil, two chubby hands have been traced in ink; occasional browning or offsetting; a remarkably good copy. Au$300

This book was child of the Mitsokushi department store, first published in 1928, reprinted fairly often and presumably updated. One of Takei's illustrations is dated 1934. Who was the titan that came up this genius innovation - the predigested baby album? Does he or she have a shrine in the marketing hall of fame? They - books like this - seem to have popped up round the world in the twenties - were they earlier? This has one foot planted in revoltingly cute of course but, thanks to Takei and a couple of fellow artists, enough pages keep the other foot in stylish and exciting.
Worldcat finds one copy - a 1938 edition at Princeton - and NDL finds two - 1928 and 1936 editions - in Japanese libraries. While doing homework on this I came across a poor - so to speak - descendant, the Blot. For a mere 20,000 yen you get something that looks suspiciously like a leather filofax - if you're old enough to remember the filofax - no cute pictures, no revolting sentiment. Poor kids.

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Fuyuki Kennosuke [Tozu to Sakuga no Jissai]. Tokyo, Genkosha 1939 (Showa 14). 20x16cm publisher's cloth and illustrated card case; b/w photo illustrations throughout. A nice copy. Au$475

First edition of this practical guide to composition of the final cropped photographic image with one of the most baffling and maybe sinister cover pictures of all time. Why is that woman in the sensational shoes lying on her back in that field. And how did she get there with those shoes still clean? Why is that woman in the background on her belly and what is she looking at? What happened? Surely nothing good.
Onchi Koshiro designed this book. He designed several of Genkosha's photography books including, I presume, his own. Note this book opens right to left
Worldcat finds a later book on composition by Fuyuki but not this.

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HARTNELL, A.P. Shop Planning and Design. London [194-]. Quarto publisher's cloth, very good in dustwrapper; 87pp, numerous photo illustrations, plans and measured drawings. Au$150

A good and not common book. Consciously wartime - "among the tasks ... are the re-building and re-fashioning of many business houses" - but pre-war in the smart modern designs. At the end are photos with accompanying plans of examples of shops and interiors by a number of architects.

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Kinoshita Circus. [Kinoshita Dai Sakasu Dan]. n.p. [194-?]. Colour lithograph poster 76x52cm. Au$300

The advertising tax stamp - lower right - dates this between 1942 and 1946; so I'm told. As does the replacement of lions and elephants with a goat. The Kinoshita circus started with the 20th century and is now one of the world's biggest.

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Poster. Sasao (?). ... [... Daitoasenso Kansui Yokusan Senkyo]. n.p. [printed by Biseido Insatsu?1942]. Colour poster 77x54cm. Folded and rumpled, a couple of small nicks; with a neat, mysterious diagram drawn in ink on the back. Signed in print Sasao. Au$600

Election poster for the 1942 general election reminding everyone to get out on April 30, vote for their endorsed candidate and ensure victory in the great Asian war. Though the whole business was meant to ensure that only endorsed Yokusan candidates could run I was surprised to find that more unendorsed than endorsed candidates ran for parliament and quite a few of them were elected. Of course that made no real difference to the running of the government and the war but it must have irked the military.

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Sawai Ichisaburo. - [Sugoroku - Dai Toa Kyoeiken Meguri]. Tokyo, Ie no Hikari 1944 (Showa 19). Colour broadside 38x53cm. Natural browning of the paper, a few pinholes, rather good. Au$400

This tour of the Great East Asia Mutual Prosperity Zone was the new year gift from the magazine Ie no Hikari. Despite the obvious bite into production quality by the end of 1943 and the disappearance of Japanese possessions further east than the western side of Papua New Guinea we, or rather children, could see that Japan was still a much loved friend throughout Asia.
Worldcat finds two copies, one in Australia and one in Singapore, but not the Harvard Yenching copy.

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Moholy-Nagy. MOHOLY-NAGY, Sibyl. moholy-nagy - experiment in totality ... with an introduction by walter gropius. NY, Harper 1950. Octavo publisher's cloth and torn and chipped but mostly complete dustwrapper; 81 illustrations (4 colour). Au$50

First edition.

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FARR, Michael. Design in British Industry, a mid-century survey .. foreword [&c] by Nicholas Pevsner. Cambridge Univ Press 1955. Large octavo publisher's cloth; xxxviii,333pp, numerous photo illustrations on 88 plates. Au$30

An excellent survey of industrial design.

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HULTEN, K.G. Pontus. The Machine as seen at the end of the mechanical age. Museum Modern Art, N.Y. 1968. Small quarto, pressed steel cover printed in colour showing the museum exterior. 218pp, numerous ills. Au$75

It's always a good career move to declare we are at the end of some age. Hulten was no slouch at staying ahead of the game. Myself, I declare we are in the post-curatorial age.

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WESCHER, Herta. Collage. NY, Abrams [1971?]. Quarto, excellent in cloth and dustwrapper; 417pp, 396 illustrations (40 tipped colour). Au$150

First edition in English of this handsome and excellent survey of the first half of the twentieth century. The projected second volume never eventuated.

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Mackintosh. HOWARTH, Thomas. Charles Rennie Mackintosh and the Modern Movement. London, Routledge 1977. Large octavo publisher's cloth and dustwrapper; 335pp & numerous photo illustrations, plans &c on 96 plates, illustrations & plans through the text. Au$75

Second edition with some amendments and a 'substantial new introduction'.

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Pompidou. Paris Paris 1937 1957 creations en france. Centre George Pompidou 1981. Quarto illustrated wrapper (knock in spine); 526pp, hundreds of illustrations, many colour. Minor signs of use. Au$50

One of the series of exhibitions that marked the triumph of the curator.

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[Mies]. BLASER, Werner. Mies van der Rohe. Furniture and Interiors. London, Academy 1982. Oblong quarto, very good in publisher's cloth & dustwrapper; 143pp, 220 photo illustrations, measured drawings &c. Au$50

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[Bayer]. COHEN, Arthur A. Herbert Bayer - The Complete Work. MIT 1984. Quarto publisher's cloth and dustwrapper; 429pp, some 400 illustrations (43 colour). Au$50

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Laboureur. TONNEAU-RYCKELYNCK, Dominique. Jacque-Emile Laboureur. Musee du Dessin et de l'Estampe Originale 1987. Small square quarto publisher's stiff wrapper (a splodge on the front cover); profusely illustrated, much in colour. Au$150

One of 100 copies with an engraving printed from one of Laboureur's original plates: Pecheurs au carrelet, 1925.

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