A remarkably bright copy, well coloured and unfaded
54 WARHOL, Andy. 25 Cats Name Sam and One Blue Pussy. New York: printed by Seymour Berlin, self published, [c.1954] £165,000 Small quarto. Original white boards, hand coloured illustration in pink and yellow and lettering in black pasted to front cover 18 offset lithographs on wove paper, each hand-coloured by Warhol and friends with Dr Martin’s aniline watercolour dye, one used as the front cover. Each sheet size: 22.9 × 15 cm. Boards lightly rubbed, [ 160993 ] otherwise a very bright copy without fading to the illustrations, near-fine. ¶ Feldman & Schellmann IV.52A–68A.
First edition, first printing, number 69 from a limited edition stated to be 190 copies signed by Warhol. Despite the numbers given in the title, the book is complete, illustrating a total of eighteen cats named Sam (one on the cover, two on one plate), and one blue pussy. The text, such as it is, is by Charles Lisanby and the calligraphy is by Warhol’s mother, Julia Warhola. The colouring is unique to each copy. The book belongs to the earliest period of Warhol’s artistic career, before he started using silkscreens in the early 1960s. Warhol had moved to New York in 1949 and began work as a commercial artist. In the 1950s Warhol translated the blotted line drawings he used as a commercial artist into an offset printing process and began making books with his friends in limited editions to be given as gifts for promotional purposes.
SIXTY FINE ITEMS
All items are fully described and photographed at peterharrington.co.uk
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