Aesop's Fables -

Providence, RI, 1956. Hanf, Brigitte. Quarto. (ix), (15)pp., frenchfold. One of six copies. Illustrated with nine etchings by Brigitte Hanf, who has also rendered the fables into verse. With an Introduction by Robert B. Gates, which indicates an affiliation with Brown University. This appears to be a possible student work by Hanf, who was the granddaughter of German folk art maker, fabric print designer, and Holocaust survivor Moritz Wallach. Hanf's etched animal figures seem to take cues from some examples of her grandfather's work. Her use of a sheet of semi-translucent Japanese tissue for an image of "An Old Lion" allows the subject of the fable to exist on his own page as well as serve as part of the mise-en-scène presented in the accompanying poem, thanks also to some clever typographic arrangement. An auspicious beginning for Hanf, who went on to illustrate an edition of Beowulf in 1968, as well as a limited edition bestiary in 1974. Accompanying this book are four mechanicals and three proof sheets for an animal-based alphabet book, the publication of which cannot be determined. Also, a typed note on a separate print of the lion from the Aesop, the text of which invites the recipient to a graduation, as well as an unsigned pen-and-ink of a stylized leopard. The book is bound in parchment-backed Cockerell paper-covered boards, title calligraphed on spine. A single straight line of adhesive offsetting to paste-downs and endpapers, otherwise fine.