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britannica - americana
The book of a generation.
Elephant-folio format (overall size 412 x 290 mm). Numbered limited
edition of 100 signed copies, this copy stamped no. 22 reserved
for Paris. Lithographs mounted on tabs. 176 pages. 62 original color
lithographs made by 28 artists each signed in pencil; 62 letterpress
poems.
Signed binding by Leroux, dated 1987. Green varnished leather binding
with leather inlays of green and pink flowers and luminescent lettering
with plastic photographic imprint (collage of advertisements), centre
of large orange flower hollowed out with see through plexiglas (fragile,
to consolidate), array of small colored plastic beads in the hollowed
plexiglas compartment, plastic photographic flyleaves, smooth spine.
Binding placed in an articulated green and textile folder, slipcase.
Dimensions: 423 x 315 mm.
This is the iconic 1964 publication created by the Chinese-American
artist and poet Walasse Ting (1929-2010) and the Abstract Expressionist
painter Sam Francis, featuring 62 colour lithographs by Pop artists
including , including colourful lips by Warhol, abstract splatters by
Mitchell, and cartoon girls by Lichtenstein. Fully-intact versions of
the artists’ book rarely arrive on the market today.
This copy is one of the limited numbered signed copies (100), and
this copy (numbered no. 22) was reserved for Paris. There were only
2000 copies printed in all.
Dedication copy with an autograph by Walasse Ting, a poem “To
Bob” (likely Bob Rauschenberg), signed and dated 4 February 1966 :
« To Bob / China big as moon / moon round as Breast / Breast soft
as flower / flower Red as fire / fire hot as Dragon / dragon not sleep
/ fly around Earth / Come to visit you / Walasse / Friday night ».
Produced with the painter Sam Francis, it was published in 1964 by
E. W. Kornfeld of Bern, Switzerland. The 176 lithograph pages were
printed in Paris by Maurice Beaudet; the typography is handset
letterpress by George Girard. Revolutionary in its assemblage of
artifacts of Pop art, 1¢ Life is a compact visual manifesto of the 1960s:
bright, psychedelic, and pulsating, a collaboration of artists who came
together under Ting’s poetic street magic.
In 1962, the Chinese-American artist Walasse Ting shared his dream
project with painter Sam Francis: to create an anthology of his poetry
illustrated by leading artists of their time. Around Ting’s poems in
“raunchy Pidgin English” were grouped 28 very different American and
a few European painters. Over the next two years, Ting and Francis
recruited Abstract Expressionists and Pop artists - Andy Warhol, Joan
Mitchell, Robert Rauschenberg, and Roy Lichtenstein, among them - to
create prints for their collaborative publication, which they playfully
titled 1¢ Life : a limited run of 2000 copies was issued of which only
the first 100 were limited signed copies. Fully-intact versions of this
iconic “livre d’artiste” rarely arrive on the market today.
“1 Cent Life” was dedicated to the Detroit-based contemporary art
collector Florence Barron, most famously known as the woman who
in 1963, commissioned Andy Warhol to produce his first self-portrait.
It’s speculated that Florence Barron put up the funds necessary to
print the edition, as one of the main themes of her collection was
her love of books and words and their relationship to contemporary
art, advertising media and culture.
Illustration :
62 color lithographs on paper, of which 34 are double
page, Pierre Alechinsky (5), Karel Appel (5), Enrico Baj (2), Alan Davie
(2), Jim Dinne, Sam Francis (6 lithographs includin "Pink Venus Kiki"),
Robert Indiana (2), Alfred Jensen, Asger Jorn (2), Alfred Leslie, Roy
Lichtenstein (2, including the cover), Claes Oldenburg (3 : "Parade
of Women" and "All Kinds of Love 1 & 2"), Mel Ramos (2), Robert
Rauschenberg (2), Jean-Paul Riopelle, James Rosenquist, Antonio
Saura, Walasse Ting, Bram van Velde, Andy Warhol ("Marilyn Monroe:
I Love Your Kiss Forever Forever"), Tom Wesselmann (2) and many
other American and European Pop artists.
provenance
Collection Fred Feinsilber (Sotheby’s, 2006, n° 459). Sale Paris,
Cornette de St-Cyr, 22 October 2012, lot 175.
bibliography
A. Coron, 50 Livres illustrés depuis 1947, p. 32. – Victoria & Albert
Museum,
From Manet to Hockney
, n° 135. – Johnson-Stein,
Artists’
Books in the Modern Era
, 1870-2000, pp. 242-243.
Exhibition Paris Bibliothèque nationale,
Georges Leroux
, 1990, p. 92.