Voyages. Six Poems from White Buildings by Hart Crane with Wood Engravings by Leonard Baskin
New York: Museum of Modern Art, 1957. 1st Edition. Oblong quarto, publisher's blue wraps side-stitched with blue string, printed title label to upper wrap, original blue paperboard chemise with printed title label to upper panel.
"The sea lifts, also, its reliquary hands." Limited edition artist’s book of poems by pivotal 20th-century poet Hart Crane with wood engravings by American illustrator and book designer Leonard Baskin, and signed by Baskin. Created twenty-five years after Crane’s suicide, Baskin’s artistic renderings are inspired by the verses and nautical imagery of this selection of six poems drawn from Crane's first book, White Buildings (1926). The second in a series of limited editions published under the direction of Monroe Wheeler for the Museum of Modern Art, the book was designed, illustrated, and printed by Baskin at his Gehenna Press, in Northampton, MA. Gehenna was established by Baskin in 1942 while still a student at Yale, and was one of the earliest and longest running presses of its kind. Illustrated with six wood engravings and one woodcut. Number 281 of 975 signed and numbered copies (from a total edition of 800). Embossed library stamp of American businessman and arts advocate George Macaulay Irwin front endpaper, with his name and hometown of Quincy, Illinois, in pencil to the inside right flap of chemise. Book fine; original paperboard chemise with some toning and edgewear. Item #6725
$325.00