Description
RARE ORIGINAL EDITION of the only children's book drawn by Sandor Bortnyika leading artist of the Hungarian avant-garde.
Text by Albert Sixtus and 21 original lithograph platesincluding cover and endpapers.
Sandor Bortnyik (1893-1976) first came to the attention of the art world through his work on posters in 1910. He worked for the Savoly perfumery in Budapest, before joining the school of painters Rippl-Rónai, Kernstok and Vaszary. Influenced by Expressionism, Cubism and Constructivism, he exhibited with the avant-garde group My [Aujourd'hui] and illustrates their magazine. Close to Lajos Kassak and the Bauhaus, Bortnyik exhibited abstract and constructivist works at the gallery Der Sturm in Berlin in 1922. In 1925, he was a founding member of the avant-garde theatre Zöld Szamar [The Green Donkey] in Budapest, for which he designed costumes and sets. From 1928 to 1938, he opened L'Atelier [Mühely], a graphic art school inspired by the Bauhaus, where Victor Vasarely was one of his students. His works can be found in numerous public collections in the United States and Europe.
Publisher's hardback, green cloth spine, lithographed illustration in colour applied to the front cover, illustrated endpapers.
Cover soiled, a few small marginal stains.