Many black & white illus. 94 pp. Large 4to, pictorial semi-stiff wrappers. Hamburg: Hauswedell & Nolte, 2000.

A scarce example of a vast collection of artists’ books and periodicals being offered at auction. Rolf Dittmar also assembled massive collections of illustrated books and cookbooks. Many of his artists’ books were shown at the famed 1978 exhibition The Book of the Art of Artists’ Books at the Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art. Many of Dittmar’s artists’ books are now at the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin.

Lots 1001-1525, nearly every item is illustrated. We note numerous materials related to Fluxus, Conceptual art, concrete poetry... More

viii, 167 pp. 8vo, orig. pink paper wrappers, uncut. Paris: Regnault-Delalande, 1803.

A rare sale catalogue, fully priced in a contemporary hand. This sale took place following the death of the widow of Jean Guillaume Alibert (?1763-180?), who died shortly after her husband. He was a well-known dealer and publisher of prints on Rue Fromenteau in Paris. The business’s stock was liquidated and the present catalogue features famous works by Audran, Callot, Edelinck, Pesne, etc.

The star of the sale, to which Regnault-Delalande devotes no less than 52 pages of the catalogue (pp. 97-148), was a “Recueil de Portraits de Souverains... More

3 pp. Small 8vo, modern calf-backed marbled semi-stiff boards (spine slightly rubbed), spine gilt. [Paris: 1769].

An interleaved and annotated copy of this rare catalogue. Amand (1730-69), winner of the 1756 Prix de Rome for his Samson and Delilah (now at the Landesmuseum in Mainz), studied under Jean Baptiste Marie Pierre and became a member of the Académie in 1767. He is very probably the “Jean François Amand or Aman” known to be working in Rome in 1759. From a printed note at the end of the catalogue, we learn that Amand died during a stay in Rome where he was a.... More

Finely engraved frontis. (mounted on a stub at an early date). xvi, ix-xii, 306, lv pp. Small 8vo (165 x 100 mm.), cont. mottled sheep, green morocco lettering-pieces on spine, spine gilt. Paris: P. Prault & J. Barrois, 1747.

The uncommon catalogue of one of Gersaint’s great auctions, with his customary erudite descriptions. The Vicomte de Fonspertuis (1669-1747), “despite a Jansenist education, entered whole-heartedly into the life of the royal court and won the favour of Philippe II, Duc d’Orléans. He developed his love of art through his maternal uncle, Du Vivier, who bequeathed him his remarkable collection, rich in curiosities, East Asian porcelain and... More

71 pp. 8vo, 19th-cent. paste-paper boards (corners a little worn), blue morocco lettering-piece on spine. Paris: Paillet & Hugues, 1786.

A rare sale catalogue, with most prices and buyers’ names written in a contemporary hand. Aubert (1736-85), jeweler to the Crown and a favorite of Marie Antoinette, as well as the Comtesse du Barry before, blended his craft with occasional forays into art dealing; however, his avid collecting took precedence. In the preface, Paillet (1743-1814), the expert for this sale, praises Aubert’s taste for Dutch and French pictures along with his impressive natural history cabinet.

This catalogue describes 293 lots: 79 lots of paintings (by Panini, J. Breughel, Rubens, van Dyck, Jordaens, Teniers, Wouwerman, Rembrandt, Metsu, Berghem, Netscher, van Ostade, A. Brouwer, P. Potter, Bourdon, Largillière, F. Boucher, Chardin, Greuze, Fragonard, Anne Valayer-Coster, etc.); 28 lots of drawings (by Bouchardon, Watteau, Lagrenée, etc.); 26 enamel miniatures; 38 lots of prints; 22 lots of sculptures; 38 lots from Aubert’s natural history cabinet; and 46 miscellaneous lots including vases with artificial flowers, bird-cages, rubies, cases of butterflies, etc. More

20 pp. 8vo (214 x 137 mm.), cont. blue paper wrappers (a bit worn), orig. stitching strengthened with scotch tape, uncut. Paris: Olivier & Henry, 1816.

A very scarce sale catalogue; the copy at the British Library was destroyed in World War II. Baget (1743-1821), a French general during the Revolution and Napoleonic Wars, amassed a choice collection of mostly Northern and contemporary French paintings. This sale’s expert, Henry, equivocates about the quality of the collection in the frank Avant-Propos.

The catalogue describes 131 lots of paintings, offering the work of I. van Ostade, Fragonard, M. Gérard, S. Ruysdael, Steen, Le Prince, Moucheron, J.... More

47 pp. Small 8vo, attractive modern paste-paper wrappers. [Paris]: de l’Imprimerie de Montalant, approbation dated 1747.

One of the major painting sales of the decade. 121 lots. Fine copy.

❧ Lugt 662. More

30 pp. 8vo (180 x 115 mm.), 19th-century calf-backed paste-paper boards (spine rubbed), spine gilt. Paris: Basan, 1773.

A quite scarce sale catalogue, which very possibly presents a number of the earliest paintings imported by the emerging expert Jean Baptiste Pierre Lebrun (1748-1813), from the Low Countries. Lugt records the consigners as “Favre, peintre à gouache” and “Lebrun.” “Favre” is also noted in this copy on the page facing the title-page. Under the auspices of Basan (1723-97), one of the pre-eminent dealers of the time, Lebrun likely consigned pieces that he had acquired on a buying trip. Basan writes in the preface (in trans.)... More

Imperial coat-of-arms vignette on title. xii, 28 pp. 8vo (215 x 132 mm.), late 19th-century blue sheep backed-marbled boards (upper & lower joints split but holding), title on spine. Paris: L’Auteur, 1809.

The large-paper version of this unusually finely printed auction catalogue detailing the personal collection of a history painter who was reçu by the Académie Royale in 1761. Belle (1722-1806), a pupil of François Lemoyne, worked at the Gobelins manufactory from 1755, where he adapted pictures by his contemporaries as well as his own designs into painted tapestry cartoons. His lengthy career saw him commissioned by the Comte d’Angiviller to design a tapestry... More

48 pp. 8vo, attractive antique calf-backed paste-paper boards, spine gilt, red morocco lettering piece on spine. Paris: Bénard, 1807.

The rare sale catalogue of a varied print and drawings collection. It describes 341 lots alphabetically by artist, with a number of large group lots, and includes works by Bartolozzi, Callot, Delattre, Hollar, van Ostade, and Watelet, as well as a number of English artists. It concludes with a handful of dictionaries, catalogues raisonnés, and sale catalogues.

Nice copy. We locate only one copy in North America. More

Three engraved plates. viii, 53 pp., [3] pages of schedule of sale. 8vo (201 x 125 mm.), gray modern cloth-backed marbled boards, title on spine. Paris: Delaroche, Billaudel & Balbastre, 1813.

A scarce example of an illustrated sale catalogue from the period, it contains three nicely engraved plates of works by Murillo, de Morales, and Rubens (most copies lack the plates). Lugt erroneously records the seller as “Billaudet.” The RKD copy has an inscription on the title-page linking the contents of the sale to Billaudel, whose name, curiously, is also found in the imprint. Billaudel concurrently operated as a dealer and painter, and it seems that... More

8 pp. 8vo (199 x 125 mm.), modern aubergine cloth, title on upper cover. Paris: Bezançon & Regnault-Delalande, 1813.

A scarce auction catalogue offering the contents of a bankrupt dealership, owned by “Blankenstein.” A chapter in a 1994 text on Franco-German relations during the French Revolution (cited below) mentions an Alexandre Guillaume Blankenstein, a converted Jew from Frankfurt, originally named Aron Levi Wetzlar, who opened a luxurious bookstore on the quai Malaquais around 1810, which then went under three years later. We know of two suites of prints published by Blankenstein. The title-page of this catalogue mentions that a judge has ordered this bankruptcy sale.

44 lots of paintings, drawings, prints, and engraved plates. Lot 35 consists of the 149 (of 179) original engraved plates used to print the famous suite known as the Cabinet Crozat (the Mariette edition of 1729-42). More