“Pocket cathedral” edition of Chaucer by William Morris completes University’s Kelmscott collection
Media Release, Thursday 24 November 2005
A rare, handcrafted edition of works by Chaucer created by Victorian-era cultural luminary William Morris has been acquired by the University of Melbourne, completing the collection of Kelmscott Press fine-printed books held by the University.
The acquisition means the entire body of Kelmscott Press publications – held by the Baillieu Library’s Special Collections – is now one of the outstanding treasures of the University’s extensive cultural collections (currently 31 separate collections). It will be a major attraction to Chaucer and Morris researchers and a valuable teaching and learning resource.
The Kelmscott Press was Morris’ idealistic vision of an artisan press, in which he used fine materials and specialist artistic expertise to create books of supreme beauty that were the work of human hands, and not made by machines. The books created for the Kelmscott Press were the antitheses of the mass-produced products that appeared after the Industrial Revolution, and which were despised by Morris, who lived from 1834-1896.
Printed in 1896, the lavishly decorated Works of Geoffrey Chaucer was purchased recently with funds from donors to the University including the Ivy May Pendlebury Bequest, the Friends of the Baillieu Library and the Library Endowment Fund. This fund is used for the acquisition of rare and significant items which would not normally be purchased from the University’s general information resources acquisition fund.
University of Melbourne Special Collections Curator Pam Pryde, who negotiated the acquisition, says the book was part of the private collection of well-known London bookseller William Foyle and was sold at Christies in July 2000 to a private European collector, and then on to bookseller Peter Harrington, from whom it was bought by the University.
“The book's provenance before William Foyle is not known, but it is likely to have been in his possession for most of its life” explains Ms Pryde.
She says the publication took four years to produce and included 87 woodcut prints designed by celebrated Victorian painter Sir Edward Burne-Jones.
“Morris designed a font for the edition appropriately titled 'Chaucer', and Burne-Jones called the book a ‘pocket cathedral’ because it was ‘so full of design’. He described it as “the finest book ever printed”.
Curator of the Kelmscott Exhibition currently on display in the Baillieu Library, Brian Allison, says when it was produced there was certainly nothing else in the history of the book to compare to it, and the closest parallel is the illuminated medieval manuscript.
“Its complexity, extraordinary juxtaposition of text, decorative borders, initial letters and strong illustrations means that it is as much a brilliantly conceived decorative art object as it is a supreme example of the book printer and binder's craft” he says.
The recently acquired edition is one of 425 copies printed on paper (a few were printed on vellum) but is considered very significant because it was bound in white pigskin with a medieval-style tooled surface, and was one of only four known copies produced with this treatment in the last year of Morris' life. It is hand printed on handmade paper in black and red ink and is in extraordinarily good condition.
Mr Allison says the Works of Geoffrey Chaucer and the press’s 51 other books ”initiated an enthusiasm for the hand-printed 'art book' and small specialty presses appeared on both sides of the Atlantic strongly influenced by the “Morrisian vision”.
A major exhibition about William Morris and his work will open at Museum Victoria on 24 November.
A celebration of the acquisition featuring guest speaker Christopher Menz, Director of the Art Gallery of South Australia, is planned for this Friday 25 November at 5.30pm in the Leigh Scott Room, Baillieu Library, the University of Melbourne.
More information:
Pam Pryde – Curator, Special Collections
University of Melbourne
Tel: 03 8344 5366
Mobile: 0425 868 301
Email: ppryde@unimelb.edu.au
Brian Allison – Curator, Kelmscott Exhibition
University of Melbourne
Tel: 8344 8822
Mobile: 0439 769 646
Email: ballison@unimelb.edu.au
Or
Astrid Krautschneider
Co-curator
Tel: 8344 5270
More Information:
Media Unit
Katherine Smith
Phone : + 61 3 8344 3845
Fax : + 61 3 9349 4135
Mobile : + 61 (0)402 460 147
Email : k.smith@unimelb.edu.au
Web : uninews.unimelb.edu.au/
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