Descripción
Birkh?user A. G. , Basel / Private printing by J. R. Geigy A. G., Basel [Published date: 1967]. Hard cover. First Edition. Text in English, French and German. Good+/ NO dust jacket. Cream textured cloth covered boards with black lettering on spine. Light scuffing and soiling to edges of covers. Light staining and bubbling to cloth on back cover. Binding tight. Faint dampstaining to first few pages with very light waviness to the bottom corners. Otherwise pages are clean and unmarked. Original clear plastic covering has a 6" slit on the back edge and several other chips and tears. Light overall scuffing to plastic cover as well. The is first collection of 48 single page etchings of various buildings and scenes of old Basle by Hans B?hler, in his effort to document the building of historic or architectural value before that become due for demolition. Each illustration is accompanied by a description of the scene in three languages as well as what happened to the building. There is a fold-out map at the back showing the location of each view. There are later editions of this book which include other buildings and views as well. NOT Ex-library. NO remainder marks. [From Preface by Hans Lanz] Topographical views are like portraits: attempts, prompted by pride and affection, to meet our compulsive need for a permanent representational record of the more attractive, or at any rate characteristic, features of a person, town or landscape. And the artist?s awareness, in either case, that outward appearances are always changing gives his work a certain tinge of melancholy. Something of this melancholy lies at the heart of most of these 48 views of Basle. Thirty years ago, as buildings of historic or architectural value in Basle became due for demolition, Hans B?hler began to record them for posterity; and he continued to do so during the periods of feverish building activity which preceded and followed the second world war. The drawings reproduced here, which are only a small part of his work, entitle him to a place among the acknowledged artists who have made Basle their subject, like the celebrated Matthaus Merian in the 17th century, or Emanuel B?chel, the pastrycook turned painter in the 18th century, not to mention the many lesser topographical artists of the romantic era. B?hler?s drawings of streets or squares or individual buildings are never idealised, nor are they specially ?posed? to attract the souvenir hunter. On the other hand they do not pretend to be dynamic structures based on inner tensions, they are not impressionist, expressionist or even cries of desperation from condemned buildings. They are straightforward records of the townscape as it was and as it is, vividly and finely drawn with many subtle undertones and shades of meaning. Every picture has an atmosphere?the Basler would call it typical and therefore ?right??an atmosphere sustained as much by the trees and flowers, people, animals and vehicles portrayed as by the actual buildings. Surprised by the beauty of a line, the charm of a group of houses or an unfamiliar vista, the eye stops to linger over the detail until it is finally caught up in the mood reflected in a particular square or street or sunlit garden, or a house in reverie. At first glance the drawings may seem to be in no particular order, but on closer inspection we realise that the artist is taking us on four different leisurely walks through a town he loves, reminding us gently of what it has been while urging us to value what it is and may yet be. N° de ref. del artículo 20200715003
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