World Food Books' programme is largely produced on Kulin Nation land. We acknowledge the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation as the first and continuing custodians of this land, and pay respect to their Elders past, present, and emerging.
World Food Books is an arts and special interests bookshop in Naarm / Melbourne. Founded in 2010, World Food Books is devoted to the presentation of a rotating, hand-selection of international art, design, literary and counterculture publications with an emphasis on the anti-traditional, the experimental, the avant-garde, the heretic, the marginal.
Presenting new titles alongside rare and out-of-print books, catalogues and journals spanning the fields of modern and contemporary art, design, photography, illustration, film, literature, poetry, cultural theory, philosophy, sexuality, popular and underground culture in its many radical forms, World Food Books wishes to encourage adventurous, thoughtful and open-minded reading, looking, writing, and exchange of publishing and ideas, both current and historical.
As well as our bookshop, located in Melbourne's historical Nicholas Building, all of our inventory is available internationally via our online mail-order service.
World Food Books semi-regularly co-ordinates "Occasions", a programme of exhibits and events at the bookshop and in partnership with other hosts (such as museums and art galleries) that develop out of the activities, relationships and content of the bookshop itself.
World Food Books
The Nicholas Building
37 Swanston Street
Room 5, Level 6
Melbourne 3000
Australia
SHOP HOURS:
THU—FRI 12—6 PM
SAT 12—4 PM
WEB-SHOP OPEN 24/7
World Food Books
Postal Address:
PO Box 435
Flinders Lane
Victoria 8009
Australia
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World Food Books Gift Voucher
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All prices in AUD (Australian dollars)
Pick-Ups
Please note: The bookshop is closed until February 1, 2024.
Pick-up orders can be collected in our bookshop during opening hours after this date. Please collect any Pick-up orders within 3 weeks of ordering as we have limited storage space. Orders will be released back into stock if not collected within this time. No refunds can be made for pick-ups left un-collected.
Return Policy
All sales are final. We do accept returns (for refund, exchange) for items received in error. All our orders are packed with special care using heavy-duty padding and cardboard book-mailers or bubble mailers (for smaller books), using reinforcement where required. We cannot take responsibility for any lost, stolen or damaged parcels.
Insurance
Should you wish to insure your package, please email us directly after placing your order and we can organise this at a small extra expense. Although all standard/express tracked packages are very safe and dependable, we cannot take responsibility for any lost, stolen or damaged parcels. We recommend insurance on valuable orders.
Interested in selling your old books, catalogues, journals, magazines, comics, fanzines, ephemera? We are always looking for interesting, unusual and out-of-print books to buy. We only buy books in our fields of interest and specialty, and that we feel we can resell.
We base these prices on desirability, market value, in-print prices, condition and our current stock levels. We offer cash, store credit, and can take stock on consignment. All
about 25% of the price we expect to get when we sell them, or 30% in store credit. We base these prices on desirability, market value, in-print prices, condition and our current stock levels.
Sell your books any day of the week. You can drop them off and return later. If you have a lot of books, we can visit your Sydney home.
We buy books that we feel we can resell. We offer about 25 % of the price we expect to get when we sell them, or 30% in store credit. We base these prices on desirability, market value, in-print prices, condition and our current stock levels.
Philadelphia Wireman
03 August - 01 September, 2018
World Food Books is proud to announce our next Occasion, the first presentation of sculptures by Philadelphia Wireman in Australia.
The Philadelphia Wireman sculptures were found abandoned in an alley off Philadelphia’s South Street on trash night in 1982. Their discovery in a rapidly-changing neighbourhood undergoing extensive renovation, compounded with the failure of all attempts to locate the artist, suggests that the works may have been discarded after the maker’s death. Dubbed the "Philadelphia Wireman" during the first exhibition of this work, in 1985, the maker’s name, age, ethnicity, and even gender remain uncertain. The entire collection totals approximately 1200 pieces, all intricately bound together with tightly-wound heavy-gauge wire (along with a few small, abstract marker drawings, reminiscent both of Mark Tobey and J.B. Murry). The dense construction of the work, despite a modest range of scale and materials, is singularly obsessive and disciplined in design: a wire armature or exoskeleton firmly binds a bricolage of found objects including plastic, glass, food packaging, umbrella parts, tape, rubber, batteries, pens, leather, reflectors, nuts and bolts, nails, foil, coins, toys, watches, eyeglasses, tools, and jewellery.
Heavy with associations—anthropomorphic, zoomorphic, and socio-cultural responses to wrapped detritus—the totemic sculptures by Philadelphia Wireman have been discussed in the context of work created to fulfil the shamanistic needs of alternative religions in American culture. Curators, collectors, and critics have variously compared certain pieces to sculpture from Classical antiquity, Native American medicine bundles, African-American memory jugs, and African fetish objects. Reflecting the artist’s prolific and incredibly focused scavenging impulse, and despite—or perhaps enhanced by—their anonymity, these enigmatic objects function as urban artefacts and arbiters of power, though their origin and purpose is unknown. Philadelphia Wireman, whatever their identity, possessed an astonishing ability to isolate and communicate the concepts of power and energy through the selection and transformation of ordinary materials. Over the course of the past two decades, this collection has come to be regarded as an important discovery in the field of self-taught art and vernacular art.
Presented in collaboration with Fleisher-Ollman Gallery, Philadelphia, and Robert Heald, Wellington.
Susan Te Kahurangi King
02 February - 10 March, 2018
Susan Te Kahurangi King (24 February 1951 - ) has been a confident and prolific artist since she was a young child, drawing with readily available materials - pencils, ballpoint pens and felt-tip markers, on whatever paper is at hand. Between the ages of four and six Susan slowly ceased verbal communication. Her grandparents William and Myrtle Murphy had developed a special bond with Susan so they took on caring responsibilities for extended periods. Myrtle began informally archiving her work, carefully collecting and storing the drawings and compiling scrapbooks. No drawing was insignificant; every scrap of paper was kept. The King family are now the custodians of a vast collection containing over 7000 individual works, from tiny scraps of paper through to 5 meter long rolls.
The scrapbooks and diaries reveal Myrtle to be a woman of great patience and compassion, seeking to understand a child who was not always behaving as expected. She encouraged Susan to be observant, to explore her environment and absorb all the sights and sounds. Myrtle would show Susan’s drawings to friends and people in her community that she had dealings with, such as shopkeepers and postal workers, but this was not simply a case of a grandmother’s bias. She recognised that Susan had developed a sophisticated and unique visual language and sincerely believed that her art deserved serious attention.
This was an unorthodox attitude for the time. To provide some context, Jean Dubuffet coined the term Art Brut in 1945 to describe work created by self-taught artists – specifically residents of psychiatric institutions and those he considered to be visionaries or eccentrics. In 1972 Roger Cardinal extended this concept by adopting the term Outsider Art to describe work made by non-academically trained artists operating outside of mainstream art networks through choice or circumstance. Susan was born in Te Aroha, New Zealand in 1951, far from the artistic hubs of Paris and London that Dubuffet and Cardinal operated in. That Myrtle fêted Susan as a self-taught artist who deserved to be taken seriously shows how progressive her attitudes were.
Susan’s parents Doug and Dawn were also progressive. Over the years they had consulted numerous health practitioners about Susan’s condition, as the medical establishment could not provide an explanation as to why she had lapsed into silence. Dawn educated herself in the field of homeopathy and went on to treat all twelve of her children using these principles – basing prescriptions on her observations of their physical, mental and emotional state.
Doug was a linguist with an interest in philosophy who devoted what little spare time he had to studying Maori language and culture. To some extent their willingness to explore the fringes of the mainstream made them outsiders too but it was their commitment to living with integrity and their respect for individuality that ensured Susan’s creativity was always encouraged.
Even though Susan’s family supported her artistic pursuits, some staff in schools and hospitals saw it as an impediment to her assimilation into the community and discouraged it in a variety of ways. Her family was not always aware of this and therefore did not fully understand why Susan stopped drawing in the early 1990s. However, rather than dwell on the challenges that Susan faced in pursuit of her artistic practice, they prefer to highlight her achievements. In 2008 Susan began drawing again in earnest, after an almost 20 year interruption, and her work is now shown in galleries around the world.
Susan grew up without television and has been heavily influenced by the comics she read as a child. She is absolutely fearless in the appropriation of recognizable characters, such as Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse, in her work. She twists their limbs, contorts their faces, compresses them together, blends them into complex patterned backgrounds - always imbuing them with an incredible energy. Although Susan often used pop culture characters in her work they are not naive or childlike. These are drawings by a brilliant self-taught artist who has been creating exceptional work for decades without an audience in mind.
Mladen Stilinović
"Various Works 1986 - 1999"
02 February 16 - September 10, 2016
Various works 1986 - 1999, from two houses, from the collections of John Nixon, Sue Cramer, Kerrie Poliness, Peter Haffenden and Phoebe Haffenden.
Including: Geometry of Cakes (various shelves), 1993; Poor People’s Law (black and white plate), 1993; White Absence (glasses, ruler, set square, silver spoon, silver ladel with skin photograph and wooden cubes), 1990-1996; Exploitation of the Dead (grey and red star painting, wooden painting, black spoon with red table, red plate), 1984-1990; Money and Zeros (zero tie, paintings made for friends in Australia (Sue, John, Kerrie), numbers painting), 1991-1992; Words - Slogans (various t-shirts) - “they talk about the death of art...help! someone is trying to kill me”, “my sweet little lamb”, “work is a disease - Karl Marx”; Various artist books, catalogues, monographs, videos; Poster from exhibition Insulting Anarchy; "Circular" Croatian - Australian edition; Artist book by Vlado Martek (Dostoyevsky); more.
Thanks to Mladen Stilinović and Branka Stipančić.
Jonathan Walker
Always Will Need To Wear Winter Shirt Blue + Ochre Small Check Pattern
21 August - 21 September, 2015
Untitled
I am not a great reader of poetry but I always return to the work of Melbourne poet, Vincent Buckley (1925- 1988). Perhaps I find his most tantalising piece to be not a finished poem but a fragment left on a scrap of paper discovered on his desk after the poet’s death.
The poetry gathers like oil
In the word-core, and spreads
It has its music meet,
Its music is in movement.
This fragment is more the shell left behind from a volatile thought than a finished poem. I find the last two lines honest but awkward whereas the first two lines work like an arrow. Most likely he could not find a resolution so it was left. Still, in its present form, it remains an eloquent testimony to the ultimate failure of a medium to express mobile thought and sensation, in Buckley’s case, through verbal language. It’s an important matter because this is something all artists have to deal with regardless of the medium.
I have never written a poem, however, I am forever copying fragments from books on paper scraps in a vain effort to fix certain notions in my head. At first, they function as bookmarks that are sometimes returned to when I open the book. But before long, as they accumulate, they fall out littering the table interspersed with A4 photocopies, bills, books and medications.
To return to Buckley’s fragment, the first two lines very much evoke how I paint nowadays. As you age, detail diminishes and patches of light become more luminous and float. I feel the most honest way of dealing with this is by smearing the oil paint on the canvas with the fingers and working close-up, blind. Only if the patches coalesce into an approaching image can the work gain a life.
-
Jonathan Walker was born in Melbourne, Australia and brought up on a dairy farm in Gippsland. In the 1970’s he studied painting at RMIT and won the Harold Wright Scholarship to the British Museum, London. During the 1980’s he exhibited at Pinacotheca Gallery, Richmond and had work shown at the NGV and Heidi City Art Gallery. Over the same period he designed the cover for the “Epigenesi” LP by Giancarlo Toniutti, Italy and conducted a mail exchange work with Achim Wollscheid, Germany. The work with artists through the post resulted in an article published in the bicentenary issue of Art and Australia 1988. He showed in artist run spaces such as WestSpace in the 90’s and 2000’s, and until 2012, taught painting at Victoria University, which is where we (Colleen Ahern and Lisa Radford) as organisers of the exhibition, among many others, had the privilege of being his student.
Walker’s knowledge was imparted to students through the careful selection of music, literature, and artists found in books that he himself had ordered for the library. Walker’s strategy was the generosity of sharing his vast knowledge with references specific to each student and their context.
Walker’s paintings share a similar focus and intimacy.
This exhibition presents a small selection of recent paintings alongside a publication that includes Walker’s writing. Observational and analytical, Walker’s work is a type of material notation — the time of day, colour and how it is blended, the both specific and fleeting location of a reflection on lino or the question of whether a chair leg should be included in a painting.
Please join us on Friday August 21 between 6-8pm to celebrate the opening of the exhibition.
Curated by Colleen Ahern and Lisa Radford.
B. Wurtz
Curated by Nic Tammens
March 26 - April 4, 2015
B.Wurtz works from a basement studio in his home on Manhattan’s Lower East Side.
This local fact is attested to by the plastic shopping bags and newsprint circulars that appear in his work. As formal objects, they don’t make loud claims about their origins but nonetheless transmit street addresses and places of business from the bottom of this long thin island. Like plenty of artists, Wurtz is affected by what is local and what is consumed. His work is underpinned by this ethic. It often speaks from a neighborhood or reads like the contents of a hamper:
“BLACK PLUMS $1.29 lb.”
“Food Bazaar”
“USDA Whole Pork Shoulder Picnic 99c lb.”
“RITE AID Pharmacy, with us it’s personal.”
“H. Brickman & Sons.”
“Sweet Yams 59c lb."
Most of the work in this exhibition was made while the artist was in residence at Dieu Donne, a workshop dedicated to paper craft in Midtown. Here Wurtz fabricated assemblages with paper and objects that are relatively lightweight, with the intention that they would be easily transportable to Australia. This consideration isn’t absolute in Wurtz’s work, but was prescriptive for making the current exhibition light and cheap. Packed in two boxes, these works were sent from a USPS post office on the Lower East Side and delivered to North Melbourne by Australia Post.
Wurtz appears courtesy of Metro Pictures, New York.
Thanks to Rob Halverson, Joshua Petherick, Sari de Mallory, Matt Hinkley, Helen Johnson, Fayen d'Evie, Ask Kilmartin, Lisa Radon, Ellena Savage, Yale Union, and "Elizabeth".
John Nixon
"Archive"
December 15 - January 20, 2014
The presentation of John Nixon's archive offered a rare showcase of this extensive collection of the artist's own publications, catalogues, posters, ephemera, editions and more, from the mid 1980s onwards, alongside a selection of his artworks.
Organized by John Nixon, Joshua Petherick and Matt Hinkley.
"Habitat"
at Minerva, Sydney (organised by Joshua Petherick and Matt Hinkley)
November 15 - December 20, 2014
Lupo Borgonovo, Janet Burchill & Jennifer McCamley,
Lewis Fidock, HR Giger, Piero Gilardi, Veit Laurent Kurz,
Cinzia Ruggeri, Michael E. Smith, Lucie Stahl, Daniel Weil, Wols
Press Release:
“...It contained seven objects. The slender fluted bone, surely formed for flight, surely from the wing of some large bird. Three archaic circuitboards, faced with mazes of gold. A smooth white sphere of baked clay. An age-blackened fragment of lace. A fingerlength segment of what she assumed was bone from a human wrist, grayish white, inset smoothly with the silicon shaft of a small instrument that must once have ridden flush with the surface of the skin - but the thing’s face was seared and blackened.”
William Gibson, “Count Zero”, 1986
"Autumn Projects Archive"
Curated by Liza Vasiliou
March 6 - March 15, 2014
World Food Books, in conjunction with the Virgin Australia Melbourne Fashion Festival 2014, presented the Autumn Projects archive, consisting of a selection of early examples in Australian fashion with a particular interest in collecting designers and labels from the period beginning in the 1980’s, who significantly influenced the discourse of Australian Fashion.
Curated by Liza Vasiliou, the exhibition provided a unique opportunity to view pieces by designers Anthea Crawford, Barbara Vandenberg, Geoff Liddell and labels CR Australia, Covers, Jag along with early experimental collage pieces by Prue Acton and Sally Browne’s ‘Fragments’ collection, suspended throughout the functioning World Food Books shop in Melbourne.
H.B. Peace
presented by CENTRE FOR STYLE
November 14, 2013
"Hey Blinky, you say chic, I say same"
Anon 2013
H.B. Peace is a clothing collaboration between great friends Blake Barns and Hugh Egan Westland. Their pieces explore the divergences between 'character’ and ‘personality’ in garments....etc
Special Thanks to Joshua Petherick and Matt Hinkley of WFB and Gillian Mears
and a Very Special Thank you to Audrey Thomas Hayes for her shoe collaboration.
Janet Burchill & Jennifer McCamley
"Aesthetic Suicide"
May 10 - June 8, 2013
The first of our occasional exhibitions in the World Food Books office/shop space in Melbourne, "Aesthetic Suicide" presented a body of new and older works together by artists Janet Burchill & Jennifer McCamley, including videos, prints, a wall work, and publications.
During shop open hours videos played every hour, on the hour.
$.00 - Out of stock
The eternal clean out! New items weekly.
https://worldfoodbooks.com/category/sale
Published by World Food Books / Melbourne
$20.00 - In stock -
A World Food Books gift voucher is redeemable in our Melbourne bookshop or via our webshop (here). An e-voucher (printable pdf) will be sent to your purchase email address (please notify us if you wish to have the voucher sent to an alternate address and wish us to fill in the receiver's details on the card).
Gift vouchers can be purchased in increments of $20 (Australian Dollars) and the total amount can simply be added to by increasing the quantity in your shopping cart. eg. A quantity of 5 gift vouchers will result in an item total of $100 - a $100 gift voucher. Simply click "ADD TO CART" 5 times, or update your quantity in the shopping cart.
If you wish to purchase multiple, separate gift vouchers in one go, please just email us and we can personally prepare and email you a payment request.
Please note: Please select Pick-Up on gift voucher purchse to avoid any postage charges. Accidental postage charges will be refunded right away!
Thank you.
For any questions, please don't hesitate to email: [email protected]
1997, Japanese
Softcover (w. dust jacket and obi), 20 x 15 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
Bunkasha / Japan
$100.00 - In stock -
Rare first edition of Japanese photographer Hiroshi Maruyama's BACKS collection, published by Bunkasha in 1997. Cover-to-cover sultry studio fetish photography of female nudes and semi-nudes photographed from behind in beautiful heavy-grain colour and b/w photography, at times reminiscent of the work of Carlo Mollino, Araki, or even Irina Ionesco with a heavy crushed-velvet 1990s erotic thriller atmosphere. A must for any bottom or leg enthusiast, or even women's garment fetishist (lots of stockings, socks, and heels). A very little known and rare Japanese title.
Very Good with dust jacket and obi-strip.
1987, English
Softcover, 68 pages, 20.5 x 13.5 cm
Out of print title / used / good
Published by
FantaCo / New York
$50.00 - In stock -
First 1987 trade "book" edition of American horror enthusiast, critic and publisher Chas Balun's (1948—2009) classic, The Gore Score: Ultraviolent Horror in the 80's, originally issued in more of a zine form in 1985, here revised and updated in all its glory. A fast and furious barrage of horror film reviews from Balun on "THE HORROR FRONTLINE, JUNE 1987".
"Dug in deep. It's the point position and the bombardment continues unabated. A shimmering, hallucinatory vision of an aging Italian grandfather appears, I'm sure as shit it's Lucio Fulci, and tells me in hushed tones, "You ...must warn the others." A steady shelling of rightfully bad horror films threatens our position and it's time to rally back. This freshly-published edition of The Gore Score will, hopefully, serve notice to the pigshit platoons of lame-assed genre poseurs who have been picking our pockets for the last seven years. It's time to strike a blow for freedom, democracy, or maybe just for good ol' mob rule".
1520 hours of horror and exploitation films, all rated and littered with graphics, stills and poster imagery.
Charlie Richard Balun (1948—2009) was an American writer and film critic for several horror magazines including Fangoria and Gorezone, known for his caustic wit and enthusiasm. Balun lived near Hollywood, California and loved monsters, zombies, and alien life forms since birth. As well as being a prolific author of horror reviews, Balun was also an accomplished graphic artist, screenwriter, creature designer and pioneer in the field of genre self-publishing.
Good copy with some light wear/marking to covers, sticker to back, light pinch to spine.
1992, English
Softcover, 64 pages, 21.5 x 14 cm
Out of print title / used / good
Published by
FantaCo / New York
$45.00 - In stock -
1992 edition of American horror enthusiast, critic and publisher Chas Balun's (1948—2009) first "book", originally issued in more of a zine form in 1983 on the cusp of the video revolution, here in the expanded book form with twice the page count. "As an enthusiastic horror fan since birth, I saw the Connoisseur's Guide as a chance to tell everybody I knew about the fundamental joys of monsters, aliens, zombies and chainsaw-wielding, bipedal carnivores." The foundational compilation of Balun's contemporary horror and exploitation movie reviews (1970s—1980s), all rated and littered with graphics and posters—a precursor to The Gore Score, before he went on to write for Fangoria and Gorezone. Argento, Fulci, Craven, Cronenberg, Carpenter, Henenlotter, Gordon, Jackson, Raimi, Hooper, Romero, Savini, De Palma, Dante, Russell, Barker, all here, plus many more, with selected filmographies, video directories and more.
Charlie Richard Balun (1948—2009) was an American writer and film critic for several horror magazines including Fangoria and Gorezone, known for his caustic wit and enthusiasm. Balun lived near Hollywood, California and loved monsters, zombies, and alien life forms since birth. As well as being a prolific author of horror reviews, Balun was also an accomplished graphic artist, screenwriter, creature designer and pioneer in the field of genre self-publishing.
Good copy with some general light wear to corner/extremities.
?, German
Softcover (staple bound), 26 pages, 21 x 15 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
? / Germany
$30.00 - In stock -
Scarce copy of X-Rated Taschenbildband Nr. 18 — the unauthorized X-Rated pocket picture book/fanzine for Man-Eater (Der Menschenfresser) also known as Antropophagus, the 1980 Italian cannibal horror film directed by Joe D'Amato and co-written by D'Amato and George Eastman, who also stars as a cannibal. A cult favourite "fringe horror video audiences", Antropophagus has been described as having "a noted place in the annals of the escalation of gore". The scene in which the titular man eater strangles a pregnant woman, tears out the fetus from her womb and bites into it, made it become one of the infamous "video nasties" that were prosecuted in the United Kingdom in the early 1980s, and the "controversy greatly aided its cult reputation". This little German book reproduces all of this in glossy full-colour, packed with film stills, lobby cards, posters and other visual documents, published rather anonymously.
Very Good copy.
1990, English
Softcover (staple bound), 36 pages, 21 x 15 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
The FFM Association / Paris
$50.00 - In stock -
Rare copy of Fantasy Film Memory Presents "Shockers" issue no. 2 of the film digest / fanzine, published in France in October 1990, and devoted entirely to "The Poet of the Macabre", Italy's giallo gore master Lucio Fulci (1927—1996). This English text book is packed with glossy colour and b/w film stills, lobby cards, posters, and on-set photos and other visual documents, not to mention loads of spectacular Fulci mania, accompanying texts and information compiled by Jean-Claude Michel. A must for any fan. The "Shockers" series was published in 4 issues between 1990—1991.
Very Good copy.
1994, English
Softcover (staple bound), 68 pages, 21 x 15 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
Yellow Press / UK
$50.00 - In stock -
Rare English film digest / fanzine by celebrated genre writer and editor of Giallo Pages, John Martin, "... And You Will Live In Terror!", published by Yellow Press is devoted entirely to Italian master Lucio Fulci's incredible 1981 Southern Gothic supernatural horror film, The Beyond, story created. Written by Dardano Sacchetti, and starring Catriona MacColl and David Warbeck, its plot follows a woman who inherits a hotel in rural Louisiana that was once the site of a horrific murder, and which may be a gateway to hell. It is the second film in Fulci's Gates of Hell trilogy after City of the Living Dead (1980), and was followed by The House by the Cemetery (1981). The Beyond ranks among Fulci's most celebrated films, and has gained an international cult following. This little book reproduces all of its glory in glossy full-colour and b/w, packed with film stills, lobby cards, posters and other visual documents, accompanying Martin's texts and production details. Martin is an author, editor and authority on the British "video nasties" phenomenon and all things exploitation all'italiana.
Very Good copy.
1970 / 1972, English
Softcover, 76 pages, 25 x 19 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
Oxford University Press / UK
$100.00 - In stock -
First 1970 edition (1972 printing) of English experimental music composer and author Brian Dennis' Experimental Music in Schools: Towards a New World of Sound, published by Oxford University Press.
"The health of an art is in danger if those who teach it fall too far behind those who practise it. This book is written to help teachers who would like to introduce truly modern music to their classes."
Brian Dennis (b. 1941—1998) studied with Stockhausen, Berio, Earle Brown and Cathy Berberian at The Cologne Course for New Music and was a lecturer in Composition and Contemporary Music at Royal Holloway College, University of London.
This was the first of two very important books—the other, Projects in Sound (1975)—which propose a new graphical form of Musical notation, showing instruments as images representing their sound, rather than traditional notation on a stave. For example, the notation of a scraping wood Güiro would be shown as zig-zag lines. Both books have been used extensively in classrooms and became part of the National Curriculum of England, Wales and Northern Ireland.
Very Good copy, light wear.
1975, English
Softcover (staple-bound), 50 pages, 25 x 20 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
Universal Edition / London
$35.00 - In stock -
First 1975 edition of English experimental music composer and author Brian Dennis' Projects in Sound, published by Universal Edition, London.
Brian Dennis (b. 1941—1998) studied with Stockhausen, Berio, Earle Brown and Cathy Berberian at The Cologne Course for New Music and was a lecturer in Composition and Contemporary Music at Royal Holloway College, University of London.
This was the second of two very important books—the other, Experimental Music in Schools: Towards a New World of Sound (1970)—which propose a new graphical form of Musical notation and experimentation/improvisation in schools. Both books have been used extensively in classrooms and became part of the National Curriculum of England, Wales and Northern Ireland.
Projects in Sound collects a number of works by Brian Dennis, Oliver Bevan, John White, Howard Skempton (of Scratch Orchestra).
Good—Very Good copy, tanning to covers, light wear.
1996, Japanese
Softcover (staple-bound), 24 pages, 29.5 x 21 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
Herald / Japan
$60.00 - Out of stock
Wonderful, rare Japanese souvenir photo booklet for David Cronenberg's Crash, a 1996 Canadian erotic thriller film written, produced and directed by David Cronenberg, based on J. G. Ballard's 1973 novel of the same name. Starring James Spader, Deborah Kara Unger, Elias Koteas, Holly Hunter and Rosanna Arquette, it follows a film producer who, after surviving a car crash, becomes involved with a group of symphorophiliacs who are aroused by car crashes and tries to rekindle his sexual relationship with his wife. The film's initial release was met with intense controversy and opened to highly divergent reactions from critics; some praised the film for its daring premise and originality, others aimed criticism for having such a strange premise filled with graphic violence. It has since developed a cult following. Heavily illustrated throughout with glossy colour and b/w stills from the film, alongside texts in Japanese about the film, cast, and production information.
Very Good copy with some some pinching.
2023, English
Softcover, 186 pages, 24 x 17 cm
Published by
Maverick Press / Whanganui
$55.00 - In stock -
Pissed off Paris is an artist's book and artist's translation by New Zealand artist David Cauchi of Baudelaire's Pissed Off Paris aka Paris Spleen, a collection of 50 prose poems composed between 1855 and his death in 1867. Published posthumously in 1869, Pissed off Paris is Baudelaire's final word on the subjects that obsessed him during his short life: the city, the crowd, the plight of the poor, the role of the poet, sex, drugs. Baudelaire was the first truly modern poet, and in these prose poems he found a modern form for his modern subject matter.
New Zealand artist David Cauchi's translation vividly captures Baudelaire's lyricism and irony. It conveys the many tones of the poems' surprisingly wide range of genres - from traditional love poems and social commentary to science fiction, horror, and comedy.
Cauchi has produced a suite of 70 drawings to complement the poems.
Introduction to Pissed off Paris by New Zealand poet Chris Tse, in the form of a poem rather than an academic essay.
Designed by Rose Miller.
1978 / 2017, English
Softcover, 94 pages, 22 x 14 cm
ed. of 1000,
Out of print title / as new
Published by
Primary Information / New York
Printed Matter Inc. / New York
$60.00 - In stock -
Variable Piece 4: Secrets is a facsimile edition of Douglas Huebler’s classic artist book, which was originally published by Printed Matter in 1978. Simple and salacious, the publication collects over 1,800 secrets written anonymously by visitors to the 1970 Software exhibition at the Jewish Museum. In doing so, the book provides a fleeting glimpse into the cultural, political, and social preoccupations of the era while showcasing Huebler’s open-ended and variable approach to art making—an approach that sought to undermine the dominance of object-oriented practices in favor of a text-driven conceptualism that relied on variables outside of the artist’s control.
Pioneers of the artists’ books medium, of which Huebler was one, predicted that one day artists’ books would be sold next to detective and romance novels in drugstores and supermarkets throughout America. While this dream was never realized, Variable Piece 4: Secrets could easily find its place amongst these popular genres; a true page-turner that delivers the whodunit in succinct statements, ripped from real life, without the hassle of narrative arcs, prefaces, or chapters.
Douglas Huebler (1924–1997) began work as a painter and Minimalist sculptor before focusing attention on language-driven conceptual art in the late 1960s. Examining themes such as duration, location, and social environments, Huebler’s work sought to move beyond the physical object, incorporating photography, text, maps, and drawings to document everyday activities, often carried out over specific periods of time. From 1970 until his death, Huebler worked on Variable Piece #70, which attempted to document every living person. The failure of this project underscored Huebler’s views on the limitations of photography. In the 1980s and 1990s, the artist incorporated painting and comic strips into his conceptual practice, exploring the idea of the masterpiece through the “correction”—or forgery—of works.
Out-of-print, As New.
1989, French
Hardcover (w. dust jacket), 168 pages, 26 x 29.5 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / fine
Published by
Adam Biro / Paris
$180.00 - In stock -
First 1989 edition of Jacques Henric's monographic volume on the great Pierre Klossowski. One of the most comprehensive books ever published on the artist, with beautiful large reproductions of artworks in colour and b/w heavily featured throughout, alongside Henric's text (in original French) with a full catalogue of works and bibliography. First hardcover printing in original dust jacket.
Jacques Henric (b. 1938) is a French literary critic, essayist and novelist.
Pierre Klossowski (1905-2001) was a significant and influential philosopher, writer, translator and artist who befriended Georges Bataille and formulated an original stance on many theological issues, as well as the philosophy of the Marquis de Sade. His first novel, Roberte, ce soir, appeared in 1954 as a limited edition containing six of his own erotic illustrations, after he rejected drawings by his younger brother, the painter Balthus. Following the encouragement of Robert Lebel, Andre Masson and Alberto Giacometti, Klossowski held his first exhibition in Paris in 1956, and subsequently produced numerous life-size drawings of erotic scenes imbued with mythological, allegorical and philosophical connotations. By the 1970s, he had won the acclaim of such eminent thinkers as Maurice Blanchot, Michel Butor, Gilles Deleuze, Michel Foucault and Felix Guattari. Of Klossowski, Gilles Deleuze once said, "That bodies speak has been known for a long time."
Near Fine copy of book and dj, preserved in archival mylar wrap.
1990, French
Softcover (w. dust jacket), 288 pages, 24 x 21 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
Centre National Des Arts Plastiques / Paris
$200.00 - In stock -
First edition of the comprehensive Pierre Klossowski catalogue raisonné published on the occasion of the major retrospective exhibition of his work held in Paris in 1990-1991 at CNAP. Profusely illustrated in colour and b/w with Klossowski's wonderful works, texts throughout by Catherine Grenier, Bernard Blistene, Claude Ritschard, Pascal Bonitzer, Marie-Dominique Wicker, Franco Cagnetta, André Masson, and Pierre Zucca (in French), a densely illustrated catalogue raisonné spanning his work dated 1952/53 through to 1990 (many not seen elsewhere), biography, exhibition history, and much more. Still the most in-depth book on Klossowski's oeuvre to date.
Pierre Klossowski (1905-2001) was a significant and influential philosopher, writer, translator and artist who befriended Georges Bataille and formulated an original stance on many theological issues, as well as the philosophy of the Marquis de Sade. His first novel, Roberte, ce soir, appeared in 1954 as a limited edition containing six of his own erotic illustrations, after he rejected drawings by his younger brother, the painter Balthus. Following the encouragement of Robert Lebel, Andre Masson and Alberto Giacometti, Klossowski held his first exhibition in Paris in 1956, and subsequently produced numerous life-size drawings of erotic scenes imbued with mythological, allegorical and philosophical connotations. By the 1970s, he had won the acclaim of such eminent thinkers as Maurice Blanchot, Michel Butor, Gilles Deleuze, Michel Foucault and Felix Guattari. Of Klossowski, Gilles Deleuze once said, "That bodies speak has been known for a long time."
Very Good in Very Good dust jacket.
1995, English
Softcover, 338 pages, 15.2 x 22.9 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
University of New York Press / Albany
$45.00 - Out of stock
This book examines the significance of Bataille's contributions to various areas of investigation: philosophical inquiry in the broadest sense; economic theory relative to waste, expenditure, and the heterogeneous; the political commitment expected of the intellectual and his relationship to the whole man; the experience of a subject at its limits, in moments of alterity, or of inscription within the literary text.
Contributors include Robert Sasso, Lionel Abel, Denis Hollier, Tony Corn, Rodolphe Gasché, Pierre Klossowski, Jean Piel, Arkady Plotnitsky, Jean Borreil, Julia Kristeva, Jean-Louis Baudry, Paul Smith, Michael Halley, Mikhal Popowski, and Susan Rubin Suleiman.
First 1995 edition, Very Good copy.
1971, English / French
Hardcover, 240 pages, 33 x 28 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / good
Published by
Societe Detudes Et De Publica / Paris
$780.00 - In stock -
Rare first 1971 edition of this must-have for any interior design enthusiast. Maison Jansen was the pre-eminent Paris interior design house of the mid-century. In 1971 they produced this exquisite, highly coveted company monograph documenting their illustrious work to date with magnificent photography and insight. Renowned for their sophisticated and luxurious style, Jansen was one of the first global interior design firms, and this magnificent book showcases their historical projects from around the world, documenting their innovative and timeless interior designs, making it a valuable item for interior designers, furniture designers, and art collectors alike.
Maison Jansen, founded in 1880 by Dutch-born Jean-Henri Jansen, was one of the first global interior design firms, renowned for its blend of traditional and modern styles. Headquartered in Paris, the firm quickly became a symbol of high-end, luxurious interior design, serving royalty, aristocrats, and the world's elite over nearly a century. Maison Jansen’s signature approach combined classical European styles with contemporary influences, creating interiors that were opulent yet tasteful, timeless yet modern. The firm was particularly known for its eclecticism, seamlessly incorporating elements from different periods and cultures to create sophisticated and harmonious interiors. Its work spanned various styles, from Louis XVI and Empire to Art Deco and modernist influences, allowing Maison Jansen to cater to the varied tastes of an elite clientele. Maison Jansen’s interiors were characterized by their attention to detail, impeccable craftsmanship, and the use of luxurious materials such as fine wood, marble, silk, and gilding. The firm employed highly skilled artisans and collaborated with talented craftsmen and artists, ensuring the highest standards of quality in every project. Though Maison Jansen officially closed its doors in 1989, its work continues to be highly regarded. Its influence is still felt in the world of interior design, with pieces and styles created by the firm fetching high prices at auctions and being sought after by collectors worldwide. The firm's legacy lies in its ability to harmonize tradition and modernity, creating timeless designs that are as relevant today as they were in the 20th century.
Edited by Jean Leveque, Antoinette Berveiller & Gerard Bonal
Foreword by G. Van Der Kemp
Good copy lacking dust jacket, some light age/wear to gilded cloth covers. One small cloth split, otherwise tight, well preserved copy.
1970, English
Hardcover (w. dust jacket), 236 pages, 26 x 26 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
Paul Hamlyn / Sydney
$200.00 - Out of stock
First, only hardcover edition of the incredible "Australian Style", one of the great unsung interior books of the 1960s/70s. Published in 1970 this heavily-illustrated volume aims to survey what the "new" (c. 1970) Australian style of modern architecture and interior design looked like through profiles on prominent Australian decorators, designers, innovators and architects of the time, including Harry Seidler, Robin Boyd, Gordon Andrews, Babette Hayes, Neville Marsh, Florence Broadhurst, Marion Hall Best, Leslie Walford, Barry Little, Ken Woolley, and Neville Gruzman, amongst many others, lavishly illustrated with photographic reproductions by Rodney Weidland of their interiors, buildings, furniture, textiles, and more. Edited by April Hersey and Babette Haynes, Australia's first Design Stylist of the burgeoning 1960s decor scene.
"Australia is developing a style of living which is as unique as the country itself. With growing affluence and the aggressive assault of mass media on our sensibilities, we have emerged from the era of composite nothingness drawn from remembered lands across the sea, and are presently finding our own standards and our own likes and dislikes in everything from pepper grinders to fifty-storey buildings. This book opens communication with the people who are making the new Australia liveable. It shows in 236 pages of magnificent colour and black and white illustration just what is happening on the frontiers of our sophistication. It voices the opinions of the experts who create our shelters. Architects like Robin Boyd, Harry Seidler and Neville Gruzman; designers like Gordon Andrews and Florence Broadhurst; interior designers like Marion Hall Best, Leslie Walford and Barry Little and the dozens of other innovators and creators who are daily adding to our knowledge and our comfort. In compiling the text, April Hersey has drawn our domestic development briefly to this time and place and then pin-pointed the rooms of a house and the work of the various designers and architects. Babette Hayes and Rodney Weidland have found the perfect illustrations for everything, from the smallest device to the most extravagant decor, to show Australian homes as they look today."
Very Good copy, with G—VG dust jacket.
2014, English
Hardcover, 202 pages, 30 x 25 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / fine
Published by
NGV (National Gallery of Victoria) / Victoria
$250.00 - In stock -
First edition of this fast out-of-print, important hardcover survey of Australian Mid-Century furniture design, edited by Kirsty Grant and published on the occasion of the exhibition, Mid-Century Modern, Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia at Federation Square, 30 May–19 October, 2014. Covering the 1940s to 1970s, Mid-Century Modern comprises the first major survey of Australian furniture and designers, including Grant Featherston, Douglas Snelling, Fred Lowen, George Korody, Clement Meadmore, and Michael Hirst. Profusely illustrated with photographic documentation of the iconic pieces, this volume included essays by prominent collectors, academics, architects and designers provide in-depth analysis of this uniquely innovative and influential period in Australian design. Contributors include Denise Whitehouse, writing on Grant Featherston, and Peter Atkins reflecting on the careers of Clement Meadmore and Michael Hirst. Neil Clerehan, Mary Featherston, Suzanna Shaw, and Dean Keep each examine the subject from a different perspective — that of the architect, designer, conservator, and collector respectively. Complete with time-line and bibliographical references.
Near Fine copy.
1998 / 2009, English
Hardcover (w. dust jacket), 72 pages, 32 x 24.5 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
Morpheus International / US
$150.00 - Out of stock
"Beksinski's powerfully unique paintings are such as I have never before seen"—H.R. Giger
Wonderful, scarce and collectible monograph capturing 30 years of the work of the great Polish painter Zdzisław Beksiński, published by Galerie Morpheus in Las Vegas. First issued in 1998, this lavishly illustrated hardcover monograph reproduces Beksiński's surreal dystopian paintings spanning his entire career, alongside an introduction by James Cowen, texts by Tadeusz Nyczek, and great quotes and reflections throughout by Beksiński himself.
Zdzisław Beksiński (1929 – 2005) was a Polish painter, photographer and sculptor. Beksiński had no formal training as an artist. Born in Sanok, he studied architecture in Kraków and worked as a construction site supervisor before turning to his passion for art, sculpting with construction site materials for his medium. His early photography would be a precursor to his paintings, often referred to as dystopian surrealism. Beksiński claimed, "I wish to paint in such a manner as if I were photographing dreams". Beksiński undertook painting with a passion, working intensely whilst listening to classical music and quickly becoming a leading figure in contemporary Polish art. In the late 1960s, Beksiński entered what he himself called his "fantastic period", which lasted up to the mid-1980s, during which he created his famed images of desolate, surrealistic landscapes with intricate depictions of anxious, abstracted figures and architecture in states of decay, mutation and decomposition. Although Beksiński's art was often dark, he himself was known to be a pleasant person with a keen sense of humour. Modest and somewhat shy, he avoided public events such as the openings of his own exhibitions and almost never visited museums or exhibitions in general. He always credited music as his main source of inspiration. Beksiński avoided concrete analysis of the content of his work, saying "I cannot conceive of a sensible statement on painting". Beksiński was stabbed to death at his Warsaw apartment in February 2005 by a 19-year-old acquaintance from Wołomin, reportedly because he refused to lend the teenager money.
"In the medieval tradition, Beksinski seems to believe art to be a forewarning about the fragility of the flesh – whatever pleasures we know are doomed to perish – thus, his paintings manage to evoke at once the process of decay and the ongoing struggle for life. They hold within them a secret poetry, stained with blood and rust." — Guillermo del Toro, Mexican film director
Very Good—Fine copy of the later expanded edition, now long out-of-print. With VG—Fine dust jacket.
2019, English
Softcover, 384 pages, 14 x 21.6 cm
Published by
University of Minnesota Press / Minnesota
$69.00 - In stock -
An archive-based, in-depth analysis of the surreal nature and science movies of the pioneering French filmmaker Jean Painleve
Before Jacques-Yves Cousteau, there was Jean Painleve, a pioneering French scientific and nature filmmaker with a Surrealist's eye. Creator of more than two hundred films, his studies of strange animal worlds doubled as critical reimaginations of humanity. With an unerring eye for the uncanny and unexpected, Painleve and his assistant Genevieve Hamon captured oneiric octopuses, metamorphic crustaceans, erotic seahorses, mythic vampire bats, and insatiable predatory insects.
Zoological Surrealism draws from Painleve's early oeuvre to rethink the entangled histories of cinema, Surrealism, and scientific research in interwar France. Delving deeply into Painleve's archive, James Leo Cahill develops an account of "cinema's Copernican vocation"-how it was used to forge new scientific discoveries while also displacing and critiquing anthropocentric viewpoints.
From Painleve's engagements with Sergei Eisenstein, Georges Franju, and competing Surrealists to the historiographical dimensions of Jean Vigo's concept of social cinema, Zoological Surrealism taps never-before-examined sources to offer a completely original perspective on a cutting-edge filmmaker. The first extensive English-language study of Painleve's early films and their contexts, it adds important new insight to our understanding of film while also contributing to contemporary investigations of the increasingly surreal landscapes of climate change and ecological emergency.
1980, English / French
Softcover, 336 pages, 24 x 15 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
Interaudiovisuel / Paris
$65.00 - In stock -
Extremely rare, independently published catalogue of Ethnographic Films produced in France throughout the 1950s—1970s, published in 1980 by Interaudiovisuel, a French non-profit organisation. Heavily illustrated with all texts in bi-lingual English and French, this rich compendium presents a selection of almost 500 ethnographic films and programs made in 16mm by French national and private companies that cover a diverse array of cultures spanning the globe, with themed chapters including customs, rituals, death rites, spirits/possession/exorcism, the language of gesture, music and dance, mysticism, festivities, craft, sculpture and painting, carnivals, tales and legends, and much more. Compiled in collaboration with the directors and the anthropologists, television and film critics, and the producers and distributors of the films, this comprehensive document is an invaluable reference on the French heritage of ethnologic films. The book includes a full index of film categories, a geographical index, list of distributors, technical information on each film, accompanied by texts in French and English on each title as an introduction.
VG copy with light wear and some softening to the front cover corners and aged gloss laminate.
2012, English
Softcover, 120 pages, 28 x 21.5 cm
1st UK Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
Creation Books / London
$40.00 - Out of stock
FRACTURED EYE was a large-format annual film journal, edited by well-known authors Stephen Barber and Jack Hunter, who between them have produced around 50 books on global cinema and cultural history. FRACTURED EYE does not concern itself with either "mainstream" or "cult" cinema, but rather takes its cue from Amos Vogel's seminal 1974 study Film As A Subversive Art. Subjects covered by FRACTURED EYE Volume One include illegal film pornography in the 1970s, execution film documents of WW2, film documents of extreme performance art, subversive film documentaries, unfilmed surrealist film scenarios, revolutionary Japanese cinema of 1969, the origins of film projection technology, films of urban demolition, surgical films, and various works of renegade, politically prohibited or transgressive cinema. The book is heavily illustrated with unusual and often disquieting photographs, and is recommended for adult readers only. Subjects covered include Vienna Aktion Cinema, Tokyo 1969, Tatsumi Hijikata, Pierre Guyotat, Koji Wakamatsu, Jean Painlevé, Cosey Fanni Tutti, Jean Vigo, Luis Buñuel, Skladanowsky Brothers, Georges Franju, and much more. Only one volume was published.
As New copy with some page edge wear from dead-stock storage.
1995, English
Softcover (staple-bound), 118 pages, 28 x 21 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / good
Published by
BLACK TO COMM / Pennsylvania
$35.00 - Out of stock
America's ONLY High-Energy magazine! The seminal BLACK TO COMM was a fanzine out of Pennsylvania, published from 1985-2003 by its creator/editor Christopher Stigliano of PHFUDD!/FUD fanzine fame. BLACK TO COMM, still high on the fumes of great outlaw rockcrit writers such as Lester Bangs and Richard Meltzer, published unapologetic, devoted, impassioned articles on rock n roll/proto punk/garage rock/psych/etc. by a number of like-minded heads and agitators. Against all odds and interest, B2C was committed to an art-form with attitude to match the music itself.
BLACK TO COMM #21 (1994/5?) features a huge VON LMO cover story and interview, interviews with Metal Mike Saunders, Brian McMahon (Electric Eels) and Ronnie Dawson, Feminine Complex, Hawkwind, The Trashmen, Velvet Underground, MC5, Teenage Wasteland Gazette, Norton Records, Leon Errol, videos, records, television, comedy, opinions, loads of images, much more...
Good copy with some coffee stains and tanning to covers.