Highlights
Each year our exhibitors bring rare, beautiful and unusual items for sale. Here are just a few of the exhibitors' highlights you can expect to see at the Fair in 2022!
Practical Observations on Insanity
$3000
The third and final revised edition of the major work by English physician Joseph Mason Cox (1763-1818). In this work he introduces his swinging technique, based on a design by Erasmus Darwin, of spinning a patient’s body round a vertical axis in a specially designed chair which would produce nausea, vomiting, and convulsions, but would ultimately lead to a restful slumber, which he believed to be a positive outcome for the maniacal. This copy warmly inscribed by Cox.
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William Jackson Hooker. Exotic Flora...1823-27
$32000
A very fine and attractively bound copy of the first and only edition of one of Hooker's rarest and most beautifully illustrated works; an important work, it includes specimens from Australia described by Robert Brown, colonial botanist Charles Fraser, and Allan Cunningham. A particularly notable inclusion is the Banksia verticillata (no. 96) from western Australia, first noticed at King George Sound by Archibald Menzies on the Vancouver voyage “and brought by him to our gardens in 1794”; this banksia, now considered vulnerable, was later codified by Robert Brown when he returned to the region
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Catalogue of an Exhibition of Paintings, Pastels, Drawings and Woodcuts illustrating Col. T.E. Lawrence's book "Seven Pillars of Wisdom". With prefaces by Bernard Shaw and T.E. Lawrence [LAWRENCE, Colonel T.E.] SHAW, George Bernard
$1000
The catalogue was issued by prestigious London based Leicester gallery, under the auspices of Cecil Phillips and Oliver Brown. The calibre of Leicester Galleries is evidenced by the advertisement on the rear wrapper for previous shows, including painting and sculptures by Van Gogh, Picasso, Matisse, Degas, Gauguin and the like.
The present T.E. Lawrence exhibition, of which this catalogue is an extant record, featured original artworks by William Roberts, Eric Kennington, Augustus John, Henry Lamb, Paul Nash, R.M. Young, Cosmo Clark, Colin Gill and Frank Dobson.
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Unique collection of Royal Flying Corps personal training materials from the Ruffy-Baumann aerial training school at Hendon [GARDNER, Flight Lieutenant C. C.] Royal Flying Corps
$1200
London: Royal Flying Corps, 1916. Collection of First World War personal training materials, comprising the following: original ring-bound notebook issued by the Royal Flying Corps with motto and insignia blocked on the front cover. The notebook measures 155 x 225 mm and contains approximately 100 sheets within card section dividers. In addition to the notebook itself, this collection includes a suite of 15 original photographs from the Ruffy-Baumann aerial training school at Hendon; with manuscript notations to the reverse indicating the identity of the owner (see description below).
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[Fan Showing Pictorical Map of Sojiji, Head Temple of the Sōtō Buddhist Sect]. 曹洞宗大本山総持寺.
$225
Black and white pictorial printed map of Sōtōshū daihonzan Sōjiji 曹洞宗大本山総持寺 on paper fan on bamboo frame, 24.5 x 2 x 2.5 cm, opens to 24 x 36 cm. Some light browning in folds. A nice copy. Kyoto. Meiji 33 [ 1900].
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[Self-improvement Sugoroku]. 出世双六. [Shusse sugoroku].
$350
Colourful folding sugoroku, 56 x 76 cm, tiny nick lower margin, a very good copy.
A sugoroku game created for New Year 1935 and published by the children's magazine Yonen Kurabu. This is an example of the 'self-improvement' genre of sugoroku, where the images in the game provide moral instruction about the importance of improving one's lot in life and contributing to the nation. Each square in the game depicts a person who (we are told) started from humble beginnings but, though dedication and hard work, achieved personal success and contributed to the wellbeing of society.
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The Novels and Short Stories of Albert Camus
$6500
A complete set of first editions in English of the novels and short stories of French philosopher and novelist Albert Camus (1913-1960), finely bound in uniform morocco leather.
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[Explanatory Map of the Recent Situation in East Asia]. 最近の東亜形勢図解. [Saikin no Tōa keisei zukai].
$1250
Large colourful folding map of East Asia, 79 x 109cm. Some creasing and closed tears along fold-lines that have been neatly repaired with archival material. A little browning along folds in lower right section of the map. A very striking map in very good condition.
Published in 1937 this colourful pictorial map shows the dynamic military situation in East Asia from the Japanese point of view. The map covers Japan, Taiwan, China, and the Soviet Union, and shows existing tensions along the borders where numerous military personnel and machines are placed.
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Silk Shawl Sample Book from Wo Sang Company, Canton.
$2500
A sample book featuring 46 hand embroidered patterned samples for shawls, 2 swatches of uncoloured silk fabric and 32 silk colour swatches. Green cloth covered boards with gilt title and date on the upper cover, marbled endpapers, re-enforced at the inner hinges but otherwise firm and sound. An extremely attractive sample book with the colours bright and vibrant and measuring 20 x 30cm.
Canton. 1928.
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