Elephant Skull - SOLD

Elephant Skull is an original modern rare book engraved by Henry Moore and written by various authors in 1970.

Published by Gérald Cramer, Geneva.

Original First Collected edition.

Format: in Folio (535 x 408 mm). Sheet Size: 498 x 366 mm.

115 numbered and signed copies

This is copy n° 8 of the edition de tête of 15 copies  with additional suite of 5 etchings.

Loose leaves in original vellum wrappers.

The book includes 28 and five numbered and signed Etchings. 

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Printed title, leaf with justification, half-title, four leaves with foreword by Henry J. Seldis illustrated with four etched vignettes, leaf with 'achevé d'imprimer', leaf with list of plates and 28 monochrome etchings by Henry Moore (numbered I - XXVIII), each printed recto only on a single sheet (sheet size: 498 x 366 mm) issued in a folded sheet with printed title and plate number and 5 additional etchings present in the suite (lettered A - E); each etching is signed and numbered by Moore in pencil. Loose as issued in original publisher's vellum printed wrappers, suite loose in additional wrapper, coarse-weave cloth box with title to front cover and spine.

Moore's involved exploration in etching of the skull of an elephant.

From the edition limited to 115 numbered copies signed in ink by Moore on the justification, with this one of the first 15 édition de tête with the additional suite of 5 signed etchings (issued only with the édition de tête).
'Moore described the elephant skull ... as 'the most impressive item in my 'library' of natural forms'. He had always collected natural found objects, including many pieces of bone, and the accumulation of such items in his original small maquette studio at Perry Green was a particularly rich source of inspiration ... Juliette Huxley, wife of Moore's friend Sir Julian Huxley, gave the skull to Moore in 1966; he had seen it in the Huxley's Hampstead garden in February 1965, a couple of yeaars fater it had arrived from Kenya.' (Mitchinson).