The Ornamental Arts of Japan. London: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle & Rivington, 1882-84.
First edition.
Two volumes. Folio. (415 x 130 mm.) [xii], v, [iii], 41; [ii], 12; [ii], 25, [1]; [ii], 44; [vi], 8; [ii], 30; [ii], 32; [ii], 29; [ii], 27, 10 pp., including index. Each volume with half-title in red, frontispiece and general title in red and black; each part with separate half-title. With 105 full-page plates, 70 of which are beautiful color chromolithigraphs, and over 80 fine text illustrations (3 in color). Each plate accompanied by an explanatory text leaf. Bound together from the original parts in half maroon morocco and Japanese silk, spines lettered in gilt with a lovely floral pattern. Aside from some minor soiling to one plate, which has been reinforced at the margin, and a repaired chip to the head of one volume, a fantastic copy.
First edition of one of the most sought after treatises on the Japanese arts, one of the most comprehensive in the field. An extensive survey of the various mediums through which Japanese artists have expressed themselves for centuries, it treats in nine parts Drawing, Painting, Engraving and Printing; Embroidery; Textile Fabrics; Lacquer; Encrusted-work; Metal-work; Cloisonné Enamel; Modeling and Carving; and Heraldry.
Audsley (1838-1925) was a highly successful British architect who designed a number of public buildings and churches along with his brother William James Audsley (b. 1833). They were both authorities in the decorative and ornamental arts, and collaboratively published a number of works in that area, including A Descriptive Catalogue of Art Works in Japanese Lacquer; The Practical Decorator and Ornamist; and The Keramik Arts of Japan (along with James Lord Bowes).
Hardie, English Coloured Books, p. 239
ID:
7041
$
5,000