London — The British Library announces it has acquired the Melford Hall manuscript, a rare seventeenth-century volume of poetry by John Donne (1572 – 1631), one of the best known poets of the late Tudor and early Stuart periods.

Discovered in Melford Hall, Suffolk in 2018, the manuscript comprises over 130 poems by Donne and is one of the five largest collections of scribal copies of Donne material. Encompassing the whole range of Donne’s poetical works, the Melford Hall manuscript includes famous verse such as ‘The Calme’, ‘To his Mistress Going to Bed’, ‘The Breake of Daye’ and ‘Sunn Risinge’ and is of outstanding importance to the nation’s heritage.

Created in the early seventeenth century, the 400-page volume features text written in iron gall ink on gilt edged paper and is bound in a quarto gilt panelled calf binding with an oval centrepiece. A contemporary of William Shakespeare, Donne’s poems tended to be copied out in manuscript for circulation among select social groups rather than for publication in print.

In 2019, the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport announced a temporary export bar on the work in a bid to save it for the nation. The British Library’s acquisition was made possible with a grant from the National Heritage Memorial Fund (NHMF) and funding from the British Library Collections Trust, the Friends of the National Libraries and the American Trust for the British Library, with thanks to Paul Chrzanowski and Patrick Donovan.

Culture Minister, Caroline Dinenage, said: ‘This hugely significant manuscript could not have found a better home than the British Library. I'm delighted that, thanks to the government's export deferral scheme, this acquisition has been made possible and John Donne experts and enthusiasts can learn from this rare volume.’

Dr Alexander Lock, Curator of Modern Archives and Manuscripts at the British Library, said: ‘The British Library’s mission is to make our intellectual heritage accessible to everyone and the discovery of this collection of poems presents a major new resource for scholarship. The Melford Hall manuscript provides evidence as to how Donne’s poetry was written, copied and circulated, as well as helping to further shape our understanding of his audiences and patrons.’

René Olivieri, Interim Chair of the National Heritage Memorial Fund, said: ‘Following its discovery in Suffolk in 2018, the National Heritage Memorial Fund is delighted to support the British Library in the acquisition of this rare manuscript of John Donne’s works. In the year that marks the 40th anniversary of the NHMF we are proud that this important piece of scholarly heritage is among the wide range of iconic artefacts that NHMF has played a vital role in saving for the nation.’

The Melford Hall manuscript is available online for everyone and will be available to researchers through the British Library’s Reading Rooms in 2021.

Los Angeles – A rare signed copy of Sun Yat-sen’s First Edition of his book The International Development of China, will be auctioned by Nate D. Sanders Auctions on December 10, 2020. The Chinese leader boldly inscribed his book in fountain pen on the front free endpaper. The book was inscribed to Harold Scott Quigley, a scholar of Chinese studies who acquired the autograph in Shanghai in 1923, possibly during the Sun-Joffe Agreement, which was held in Shanghai in January 1923. In the original publisher's binding, the book contains all maps, including the folding map housed in the rear pastedown pocket. The Book measures 5.675'' x 8.25'' and runs 265pp. An important book authored by Sun Yat-sen, the founding father of China, and scarce as signed by him. Bidding for the book begins at $6,000.

Additional information on the book can be found at: https://natedsanders.com/Sun_Yat_sen_Signed_First_Edition_of_His_Book___The-LOT59048.aspx

Dallas, TX – In 1956, upon the occasion of L. Frank Baum’s 100th birthday, Justin Schiller loaned to Columbia University impossible-to-find copies from the author’s Land of Oz series. At the time, Schiller, the sole son of antique-hunters, was all of 12 years old.

That head start – which began with little Justin browsing New York City’s “Book Row” along 4th Avenue, his pocket full of nickels – “propelled me into the rare-book scene,” Schiller says. He had begun collecting at 8, and by 1960 Columbia University’s favorite pre-teen had already become one of the world’s preeminent experts in and collector of children’s literature.

Sixty years later, after decades as a seller of rare and wonderous books for kids and the grown-ups who raised them, Schiller brings his breathtaking assemblage of extraordinary rarities to Heritage Auctions for a one-day event spanning centuries. The Dec. 16 auction, titled Once Upon a Time: Rare Children's Literature from Justin G. Schiller, Ltd., is a truly historic occasion.

“It’s probably going to be the most important auction of rare children’s books that has ever been held in America,” Schiller says. “I say that as modestly as I can say it.”

Here, one can time travel from 1697 (a pirated copy of Charles Perrault’s Histoires ou Contes du Temps Passé, containing all eight of his beloved fairy tales) to 1837 (an inscribed copy of Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm’s Kinder- und Hausmärchen, gifted to a woman who inspired and provided some of the fairy tales to the Brothers Grimm) to the 1960s (when a young Shel Silverstein handcrafted the first manuscript to his classic Uncle Shelby's ABZ Book).

Here, one will find a first printing of the first edition of the privately published The Tale of Peter Rabbit from 1901, when no publisher would touch Beatrix Potter’s “bunny book” now one of publishing’s all-time best-sellers. And an inscribed first printing of the first edition of Hans Christian Andersen’s Eventyr, Fortalte For Børn from 1835. And Theodor Seuss Giesel’s original drawing from 1938 titled "Matilda The Compassionate Elefant Who Devotes her Days to the Hatching of Orphan Humming Bird Eggs,” featuring Dr. Seuss’s earliest incarnation of the character eventually called Horton.

And, of course, here, too, is a first edition of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz published 120 years ago.

“It’s just amazing, the breadth of this sale,” says James Gannon, Heritage Auctions’ Director of Rare Books. “So many of the offerings are museum-quality. Auctions always have their highlights, and these usually limited to a handful out of many. But thanks to Justin’s diligence and determination, nearly every offering here is a highlight.”

Look no further than The Tale of Peter Rabbit available in this event, which is not only one of the 250 privately published copies made available in December 1901, but one annotated by Potter herself on the copyright page, where she has written in pencil, “F. Warne & Co 15 Bedford St Strand/to be published in the autumn 1902.” Potter paid for the copies herself when she could find no takers, and peddled the tome to nearby booksellers in the hopes of getting them to carry the official release forthcoming from Frederick Warne & Co., who eventually published 23 Potter titles between 1902 and 1930.

Here, too, is her circa-1890s illustration Dancing to the Piper, featuring seven bunnies frolicking to a tune played by the rabbit perched on the stool in the center. When Gannon speaks of museum-quality, this is such a piece: Four illustrations from “The Rabbit’s Christmas Party” series, from which the Piper comes, are featured in the collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, the world’s largest repository of Potter’s drawings, manuscripts and correspondence.

Many of the artifacts that didn’t find their way into the museum’s collection can be found here, among them three handwritten manuscripts for Wag-by-Wall, which first appeared in 1944 in the pages of The Horn Book Magazine of children’s literature. And each of those comes with its own archive: One is accompanied by 11 missives from Potter to Horn Book editor Bertha Mahony Miller, two of which bear illustrations of a Wag-by-Wall clock; one includes a draft of Wag-by-Wall as part of a larger story called "The Solitary Mouse" (entirely unpublished); the other features the first American edition of the book.

And, separately, there is the 1942 questionnaire The Horn Book Magazine asked Beatrix Potter to complete, in which the author handwrites a biography not seen until now, as the collection for which it was intended only saw publication after her death in 1943. This extraordinary offering is accompanied by two letters Potter sent to Miller, with whom she became friends in the months before her death. The entirety presents an intimate portrait of the writer heretofore unavailable, and preserved by Schiller with the eye of a scholar and heart of an admirer.

No less extraordinary is the 1837 edition of Kinder- und Hausmärchen by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm.

This two-volume edition is the first enlarged, which is to say unabridged, edition – remarkable enough. But what makes it altogether extraordinary is the inscription inside the first volume, in which Wilhelm Grimm writes, “Dem lieben Malchen Hassenpflug / von seinem Treuen Freunde / Wilhelm Grimm. / Göttingen 23 October 1837” – that is, “To dear Malchen Hassenpflug from her true friend Wilhelm Grimm.”

Malchen was merely a nickname bestowed to Amalie Hassenpflug, a friend of the family’s and one of three sisters who contributed, significantly, to the Brothers Grimm’s collection of Children’s and Household Tales. Indeed, Amalie is thought to have contributed about 10 tales, as did her sister Jeanette, and the eldest Marie likely contributed more than 20.

“This is Wilhelm Grimm’s gift to one of the sources of the fairy tales,” says Samantha Sisler, Production Specialist in Heritage’s Rare Books department. “He wrote them down, but she’s the source. This is certainly among the most important association copies of Grimm’s Fairy Tales. To acquire a book of this significance – collectors likely won’t get another chance.”

But without Charles Perrault, the world may never have heard of the Brothers Grimm. After all, the former secretary to Jean-Baptiste Colbert, minister to Louis XIV of France, made fairy tales of folk stories, most famously “Cinderella,” “Sleeping Beauty,” and “Little Red Riding Hood” among several other immortals – some of which were nicked by the brothers for their own collection.

Of course, no Schiller sale would be complete without a copy of Perrault’s Histoires ou Contes du Temps Passé, otherwise known as Tales and Stories of the Past. And, of course, his is one of the earliest and finest known from the year of its publication, 1697. But what makes this copy altogether outstanding is its origin: This was an unauthorized printing, published the same year as the first edition, likely from a shop in Amsterdam, proof of how quickly word spread of Perrault’s work.

“It’s just a tiny thing that just about fits in the palm of my hand,” Sisler says, “and yet its woodcuts are so detailed – it is incredible.”

So, too, is the handwritten manuscript for Shel Silverstein’s Uncle Shelby's ABZ Book – a copy that looks like it was made by children for children, though what lies beneath the slightly tattered pink exterior is profoundly adult. After all, Silverstein, who had not yet shown us where the sidewalk ends or flipped on the light in the attic, had originally presented some of these pages in Playboy; hence its declaration as a “primer for tender young minds.”

“The Silverstein manuscript is to be treasured, but there are 530 lots in this event, and just about every one is a highlight,” Gannon says, and rightly so.

Schiller has spent decades collecting not only for his customers and clients, but for himself. And as he likes to say, he often wouldn’t part with a book if “I hadn’t found the right person who I felt deserved our offering of it.”

Until now.

Cincinnati, OH – For the second time in as many auctions, the Steve Turner Collection of African Americana once again surpassed its presale estimate at Cowan’s Auctions. The December 3 auction featured the second and final part of one of the most remarkable collections of African Americana to come to market in recent years. It was not lost on bidders that this could be the last opportunity to own a piece of the collection, as evidenced by the $377,196 price realized which totaled more than $100,000 above the sale’s $269,350 presale estimate. When combined with the total of Part I, which was offered in February 2020, the collection sold for a combined total of $989,887.

The Road West: The Steve Turner Collection of African Americana illustrated the history of African Americans and their role in settling the western frontier in the 19th and early 20th century.

“We were delighted to offer this important collection, and gratified by the response from both private and institutional collectors,” said Wes Cowan, Hindman Vice Chair and Cowan’s Founder. “The ephemeral material in the Turner collection is important, direct evidence of the struggles and triumphs of African Americans in their post-Civil War march to full citizenship.”

Steve Turner is perhaps most widely known for his eponymous Los Angeles-based contemporary art gallery, but he has spent his entire life assembling an unrivaled historical record of the American west.

New York — Paris Photo and Aperture Foundation, in partnership with DELPIRE & CO, are pleased to announce the winners of the 2020 Paris Photo–Aperture Foundation PhotoBook Awards. Living Trust by Buck Ellison (Loose Joints Publishing, Marseille, France) is the winner of $10,000 and the First PhotoBook award. Woman Go No’Gree by Gloria Oyarzabal (Editorial RM, Barcelona, and Images Vevey, Switzerland) is the winner of PhotoBook of the Year. The selection for Photography Catalogue of the Year is Imagining Everyday Life: Engagements with Vernacular Photography, edited by Tina M. Campt, Marianne Hirsch, Gil Hochberg, and Brian Wallis (Walther Collection, New York, and Steidl, Göttingen, Germany). A Jurors’ Special Mention for First PhotoBook goes to LIKE by Ryan Debolski (Gnomic Book, Brooklyn).  

An exhibition of the thirty-five books shortlisted for the 2020 PhotoBook Awards, as well installations drawn from Issue 018 of The PhotoBook Review—guest edited by artist, scholar, and pioneer photo historian Dr. Deborah Willis, and with a focus on cultural histories in relation to the Black body, women, and gender—is hosted by DELPIRE & CO bookshop (13 rue de l’Abbaye, 75006 Paris), open to the public Wednesdays through Sundays, 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.

A weekend of online conversations with artists and publishers from this year’s shortlist, as well as members of the jury, in discussions of their work and the critical role of photobooks, will take place on December 5 and 6, 2020. Registrations are open at delpireandco.com/prix-du-livre-photobook-review-conversations-en-ligne.

Living Trust by Buck Ellison (Loose Joints Publishing, Marseille, France), winner of the First PhotoBook Award, was praised for its investigation of the visual language of privilege. Taken together, the series in the book offer a sustained, almost anthropological examination of the ways whiteness and privilege are both recapitulated and broadcast. “Living Trust emerged in our conversations as something that focuses really well on what many take for granted,” shortlist juror Oluremi C. Onabanjo commented. “The book is carefully shaped in relation to the subject, in its form as much as in the artist’s approach to white privilege—a very contemporary subject—and addressed with very personal writing,” concluded Nicolas Poillot, who served as part of the final jury.

In Woman Go No’Gree by Gloria Oyarzabal (Editorial RM, Barcelona, and Images Vevey, Switzerland), winner of PhotoBook of the Year, the artist explores colonialism and white feminism in West Africa through the use of found imagery, archives, and her own photography. “Both substance and form of the book are compelling. The artist advances an excellent dialogue around deconstructing the idea of the gaze and ‘the other,’” states final juror Damarice Amao. “The layout and the intelligent, inventive—even destabilizing—graphic design serve her purpose very well.” In this beautifully and thoughtfully crafted book, Oyarzabal challenges the viewer to engage with their own biases and assumptions.  

Imagining Everyday Life: Engagements with Vernacular Photography, edited by Tina M. Campt, Marianne Hirsch, Gil Hochberg, and Brian Wallis (Walther Collection, New York, and Steidl, Göttingen, Germany), winner of Photography Catalogue of the Year, “provides a multifaceted snapshot of thought around the problematics of vernacular photography” and is “an essential reconsideration of the topic,” according to shortlist juror Joshua Chuang. Final juror Lucy Conticello added, “The heft and the depth of the research, its striking and insightful contributions sourced from a great number of archives and collections, and fantastic reproductions make this a reference book on vernacular photography that will be around for a long time.”

Finally, LIKE by Ryan Debolski (Gnomic Book, Brooklyn), nominated as the Jurors’ Special Mention for First PhotoBook, explores the experiences and relationships of migrant workers in Oman. But rather than focusing on the defining public image of poor working conditions, Debolski depicts men finding agency and connection to the landscape of the beach and companionship in each other—they are as playful as they are introspective. “The position this work takes is very singular,” juror Stéphanie Solinas affirms, “a book on migrant workers in Oman, where we find a great presence of bodies with a form of sensuality where we expected to find brick walls and deserts. The weave between text and image, bodies and architecture offers a new, unexpected entry into the topic.” 

A final jury in Paris selected this year’s winners. The jury included Damarice Amao (Centre Pompidou), Lucy Conticello (M le magazine du Monde), Laurel Parker (Laurel Parker Book), Nicolas Poillot (creative director and image consultant), and Stéphanie Solinas (artist).  

This year’s shortlist selection was made by a jury comprising Joshua Chuang (New York Public Library), Lesley A. Martin (Aperture Foundation), Sarah Meister (Museum of Modern Art), Susan Meiselas (photographer, Magnum Foundation), and Oluremi C. Onabanjo (independent curator and historian).

Berkeley, California – PBA Galleries will present an auction of Americana – Travel & Exploration – World History – Cartography on December 17th, 2020. Offerings include three-hundred and eighty lots of rare and varied material, an eclectic gathering of historical and cultural interest, with much on California and the western portions of the United States, but ranging beyond to the eastern seaboard, up to Canada, across the seas and around the globe. Included are printed books from four centuries, maps dating back to the 16th century, photography from its infancy through the 20th century, and an abundance of scarce ephemera.

Competitive bidding is expected for one of the sale’s headline lots, a mammoth plate albumen photograph by Carleton E. Watkins of the Cliff House, San Francisco. The photograph looks down from the dunes, Seal Rocks behind, the vast Pacific Ocean beyond, Watkins’ “photo wagon” parked in front (Estimate: $10,000-$15,000). Other views of San Francisco are represented in a rare real estate brochure for Richmond, California, 1911, with a striking full color “Aeroplane View” looking across the bay towards San Francisco and the Golden Gate (Estimate: $1,500-$2,500). The City also appears in a brilliant large color lithograph of the interior of the Sutro Baths on the western shore of San Francisco, measuring nearly seven feet square, the colors bright and unfaded (Estimate: $5,000-$8,000).

Other Americana in the sale spans the continent: New Hampshire is represented by a collection of fifteen daguerreotypes and ambrotypes of members of the Hill family of Greenland, New Hampshire, including various relatives and friends, and a view of the family farmhouse, circa 1848-1855 (Estimate: $3,000-$5,000). Further south, Texas; Ein Handbuch für deutsche Auswanderer, 1845, a rare handbook for German immigrants was published the year before Texas was absorbed into the United States (Estimate: $8,000-$12,000).

In world history, the auction block will see an engraved chart of a portion of the Swedish coast and points inland by Lucas Jansz Waghenaer, c.1585, with engraved vignettes of sailing ships, sea monsters, farms, villages, and other features (Estimate: $1,500-$2,500). Books feature in the sale, as well: The Gold Mines of Midian, by Richard F. Burton, the second edition, a presentation copy inscribed by the author and signed by him using his Arabic alias (Estimate: $1,500-$2,500).

Other highlights include a sheet signed by the seven Mercury astronauts, being the second page of an autograph letter signed by John Glenn, “Mercury Astronaut,” dated Sept. 29, 1959, with envelope hand-addressed by Glenn (Estimate: $5,000-$8,000). The Confederate States of America, Register of Vessels, April 7, 1862 is a rare document from the Confederacy, listing the fifty-four-ton schooner “Blanchette,” John F. Gilbert the Master (Estimate: $3,000-$5,000).

PBA continues to safeguard the health of employees and clients by remaining closed to the public. PBA will limit live auction participation to online or phone bidding. For more information about upcoming sales or to schedule a Zoom preview or phone bidding for a future auction, please contact the galleries at 415.989.2665 or pba@pbagalleries.com.

Los Angeles – A scarce first edition, first printing of Charles Darwin’s iconic book, On the Origin of Species will be auctioned by Nate D. Sanders Auctions on December 10, 2020. In this revolutionary book that upended man's own view of himself, Darwin posits natural selection as the engine driving species' evolution, an argument so persuasive that even 19th century religious leaders adjusted their teachings to allow for evolution to work in concert with divine planning. Its importance has only grown in the 150+ years since publication, with Freeman concluding it to be ''the most important biological book ever written.’’ The book was first released on November 24, 1859. The book’s first printing consisted of only 1,250 copies, and the number of extant copies are now significantly fewer. Bidding for the book begins at $135,000.

Additional information on the book can be found at: https://natedsanders.com/LotDetail.aspx?inventoryid=58877

Washington, D.C. — The Library of Congress will award the 2020 Rebekah Johnson Bobbitt National Prize for Poetry to Terrance Hayes, for his book “American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin,” and to former U.S. Poet Laureate Natasha Trethewey for lifetime achievement.

The poets will receive their honors during a virtual ceremony Thursday, Dec. 10, at 7 p.m. ET on the Library’s Facebook page at facebook.com/libraryofcongress and YouTube channel at youtube.com/loc. The public is invited to attend this virtual event.

The 2020 prize — the 16th to be given — is awarded for the most distinguished book of poetry published in the preceding two years, 2018 and 2019, and for lifetime achievement in poetry. Hayes’ book, “American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin,” was published by Penguin Books in 2018. Trethewey is the author of five poetry collections, most recently “Monument: Poems New and Selected,” published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt in 2018.

“We are thrilled by the news that Terrance Hayes and Natasha Trethewey have won the 2020 Rebekah Johnson Bobbitt National Prize for Poetry,” said Philip Bobbitt, son of Rebekah. “We congratulate not only the gifted winners but also the dedicated jurors.”

The panel of jurors for this year’s prize included poet and former executive director of the Poetry Society of America Elise Paschen, selected by 23rd Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry Joy Harjo; former Indiana poet laureate Adrian Matejka, selected by Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden; and scholar Betty Sue Flowers, selected by the Bobbitt family.

The Bobbitt jury noted that Hayes’ “American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin” (2018) “transforms the classic sonnet into a startling, American version” and that “Hayes navigates America’s political history, art and poetics in unexpected and timely ways that transform our understanding of both our history and ourselves.”

Hayes, a recipient of the National Book Award, has published six collections of poetry. His most recent is “American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin,” which received the 2019 Hurston/Wright Foundation Legacy Award for poetry and was a finalist for numerous prizes. Hayes’ other honors include a Whiting Writers Award, an NAACP Image Award for Poetry and a Pegasus Award for Poetry Criticism, as well as fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Guggenheim Foundation. In 2014, he received a MacArthur Fellowship. Hayes was elected a chancellor of the Academy of American Poets in 2017 and serves as an ex officio member of the academy’s board of directors. He is currently a professor of English at New York University.

Trethewey is the author of five collections of poetry and two books of nonfiction. She served two terms as the 19th Poet Laureate of the United States (2012-2014), during which she launched her signature project, “Where Poetry Lives,” with the PBS NewsHour. Her latest book is “Memorial Drive: A Daughter’s Memoir.”

The Bobbitt jury noted that Trethewey’s latest work of poetry, “Monument,” (2018) “reveals the arc of her poems as a poignant and compelling new narrative. The collection illuminates her far-reaching range while also serving as a testament to the integrity of her poetic vision.” Trethewey has also served as the state poet laureate of Mississippi. She is a recipient of many fellowships, including from the Academy of American Poets, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Guggenheim and Rockefeller foundations. Trethewey is currently the Board Trustees Professor of English at Northwestern University.

The biennial Bobbitt Prize, which carries a $10,000 award, recognizes a book of poetry written by an American and published during the preceding two years, or the lifetime achievement of an American poet, or both. The prize is donated by the family of Rebekah Johnson Bobbitt of Austin, Texas, in her memory, and awarded at the Library of Congress. Bobbitt was President Lyndon B. Johnson’s sister. While a graduate student in Washington during the 1930s, Rebekah Johnson met college student O.P. Bobbitt when they both worked in the cataloging department of the Library of Congress. They married and returned to Texas.

Past winners of the Bobbitt Prize can be viewed at loc.gov/programs/poetry-and-literature/prizes/bobbitt-prize/.

Basel, Switzerland — This year, we are all looking for ways to reassure ourselves, to make the world seem less unpredictable than it has been over the last twelve months. The Salon d’Hiver Virtuel allows visitors to take comfort in the centuries of unchanging knowledge and artistry on display, joining over 100 exhibitors to celebrate rare books.

Many of the items on display from Dr. Jörn Günther Rare Books have the art of perspectival and technical drawing at their hearts. While these treatises were created by Renaissance writers and artists with specialist knowledge, a 21st century reader is not excluded from enjoying their insights.

Albrecht Dürer’s The Large Passion (1511) needs no introduction; in twelve large woodcuts the artist explores a leitmotif that stayed with him throughout his life and artistic career. The Passion of Christ is depicted with high emotional intensity, and is accompanied here by Benedictus Chelidonius’ Passion, a hexameter poem. Chelidonus was a Benedictine monk from the monastery of St. Egidius in Nuremberg; this present copy is the first edition of the book form with his text.

London — This month, Bonhams hosts two Prints & Multiples sales – one in Knightsbridge on Wednesday 9 December, and one in New Bond Street on Tuesday 15 December. Leading the New Bond Street sale will be the legendary artist’s book, Jazz by Henri Matisse, which has an estimate of £240,000-300,000.

In 1941, when Henri Matisse was near bedridden with intestinal cancer, he started creating a body of work which appeared to capture movement on a page. His ground-breaking artist’s book, Jazz, – containing 20 pochoirs of his signature bold, expressive, and vibrant cut-outs, alongside poetic text – marked a crucial transition into a new medium for the artist and left a trail of colour across the blank space. Published in 1947 and limited to 250 copies, Jazz was an unprecedented success.

Lucia Tro Santafe, Department Director of Bonhams Prints & Multiples, New Bond Street, said: “We’re very excited to be able to offer one of Matisse’s greatest masterpieces, the illustrated book Jazz in our forthcoming sale. Originally entitled Cirque, the improvised themes and compositional variations prompted the publisher Tériade to suggest Jazz as an alternative title, and the creation captures the experimental, playful and musical nature of some of Matisse’s most popular works.”

Other highlights of the New Bond Street Prints & Multiples sale include: 

• An Important Collection of prints by C.R.W Nevinson including his most iconic War subjects; Banking 4,000 Feet. Estimate £15,000-20,000
• Banksy (born 1975), Girl with Balloon. Estimate: £120,000 - 180,000.
• Roy Lichtenstein, (1923-1997), Nude Reading, from Nude Series. Estimate: £60,000 - 80,000.
• Pablo Picasso (1881-1973), Tarasque. Estimate: £55,000 - 75,000.

Prints & Multiples, New Bond Street, 15 December:
Link to catalogue: https://www.bonhams.com/auctions/25948/

At Bonhams Knightsbridge on 9 December, a selection of over 130 works by the leading 18th century caricaturist James Gillray will be offered at the Prints & Multiples sale – Part II, all from The Arthur N. Gilbert Collection of Important Prints by James Gillray (1756-1815). The historically important etchings, which span the last three decades of the late 18th and early 19th centuries, capture Gillray's outstanding body of political and social satire.

Speaking of his collection, Arthur N. Gilbert commented: “As an historian, I appreciated the acerbic wit and wickedness James Gillray unabashedly displayed… The use of comedy as the foe of pomposity is a never-ending antidote to those around us who are so filled with their own self-importance that they forget, after all, we are all human. James Gillray’s work never ceases to amuse me.”

Bonhams Prints Department Director at Knightsbridge, Carolin von Massenbach, said: “James Gillray is the father of political cartoon and this large collection represents an outstanding body of work that has been exceptionally well-preserved. Satire continues to be a source of relief from the world. It is particularly timely that we are able to offer this important collection in our next sale alongside iconic Banksy works continuing this legacy today.”

As with the Prints & Multiples sale in New Bond Street, the Prints & Multiples sale in Knightsbridge will also offer a fantastic selection of works by Banksy. The sale also includes a strong Modern British section by artists such as Howard Hodgkin and an extensive variety of contemporary works by leading artists such as Tracey Emin, Damien Hirst, Harland Miller and David Hockney. Highlights include:

• Banksy (born 1975), Pulp Fiction. Estimate: £30,000 - 50,000.
• Banksy (born 1975), Jack and Jill. Estimate: £25,000 - 35,000.
• Banksy (born 1975), Happy Chopper. Estimate: £25,000 - 35,000.
• David Hockney (British, born 1937), Pool Made with Paper and Blue Ink for Book. Estimate: £15,000 - 20,000.
• Sir Howard Hodgkin (British, 1932-2017) Acquainted with the Night. Estimate: £6,000 - 8,000.

Prints & Multiples, Knightsbridge, 9 December:
Link to catalogue: https://www.bonhams.com/auctions/26026/