DOVEY, Gaven. BASKIN, Leonard. HECHT, Anthony. ~ The Gehenna Florilegium.
No.31 of 50 copies, signed by the poet Anthony Hecht and Leonard Baskin. 15 colour woodcuts by Leonard Baskin, all signed and numbered by the artist in pencil, colophon with pomegranate woodcut by Baskin printed in red. Printed on Italian handmade paper by Arthur Larson of Hadley, Mass. Title leaf and 32 pp. Folio, bound by Gavin Dovey in a Bradel split-board binding in dyed and sanded goatskin to resemble tree bark, boards decorated with inlays of wood veneer and variously dyed and inked goatskin with cuts into the covers to resemable tendrils and black and gilt hand tooling on both sides, spine lettered in gilt. The doublures and flyleafsare monoprints from cross-sections of an oak tree. Housed in a suede lined chemise and slipcase of morocco and stone veneer and in an articulated clamshell box in stone leaf with a remarkable built in book cradle.
A remarkably fine binding by Gavin Dovey who, after training the UK, set up shop in the US in 2004 and now works as a book artist out of his New York State bindery known as Paper Dragon Books. He is renowned as one of the most accomplished binders of our time being technically brilliant as well as having a true artist’s approach to binding design. This binding toured with the Designer Bookbinders International Binding Competition books as a non-competitive entry.