Fold, Flap, Peek, Pull, Pop

Regiomontanus’ Calendarium was first printed at his own press in Nuremberg in 1474. In 1476, master printer Erhard Ratdolt published it in Venice, the capital of Italian printing, followed by this edition in 1482. These two Ratdolt editions rank among the most beautifully illustrated scientific books produced in the fifteenth century. Regiomontanus is one of the great figures in the history of mathematics and astronomy. The Calendarium represents the first application of modern scientific methods of astronomical calculation and observation to the problems of the lunar calendar, such as the timing of Easter, and the accurate prediction of eclipses. Regiomontanus’ almanacs contain planetary positions for a particular year as calculated from astronomical tables, freeing astronomers from performing the laborious task themselves. This edition also contains verses by J. Sentius in praise of the author, and by Santritter in praise of the printer. Santritter would later become a printer himself. The last two leaves are printed on four pages of thick paper pasted together to incorporate vovelles, astronomical instruments. The ingenuity of the instruments demonstrates Ratdolt’s technical skill in overcoming the challenges posed by early scientific publishing. This edition was not only technically innovative but artistically elegant as well. There are woodcut initials throughout the book. The title-page initial is printed in red and black and bordered with intricate decoration. Breaking with printing tradition, Ratdolt included imprint details – that is, the information that tells us when and by whom the book was printed – at the end of the opening verses on the verso of the title-page, rather than at the end of the book in the colophon, as was the usual practice.

First published in Venice in 1588 as Theatrum mundi, et temporis, this book presents the forty-eight maps of the Ptolemaic constellations and depicts them as mythologic figures. The star positions are taken from Copernicus’ De revolutionibus orbum coelestium. Giovanni Paolo Gallucci’s Theatrum is considered the first modern celestial atlas because in its maps he used a coordinate system and a trapezoidal system of projection common among geographic cartographers of the time, allowing an exact determination of the star positions. The lively constellation figures overlay very accurate maps of the stars. Gallucci’s text is an encyclopedia of astronomical knowledge. He describes the Ptolemaic theories of the movement of the planets, the sun, the moon, and eclipses. Tables illustrate the earth, a Dantesque hell, and a forecast of the equinoxes from 1588 to 1800. This edition contains several complex vovelles to aid in calculations.

One of the most immediate consequences of the telescopic observations of Galileo in 1609-10 was the intense discussion it generated among the mathematicians and astronomers of the Society of Jesus. They closely followed and reproduced Galileo’s observations and debated the cosmological order of the universe considering the new information. The debate culminated with the adoption of Tycho Brahe’s system and was made official with the publication of Giuseppe Biancani’s Sphaera Mundi. The Jesuit Biancani fully accepted Brahe’s amendation of the Copernican cosmography which acknowledged the heliocentricity of the planetary system while preserving the geocentricity of the universe. Biancani wrote his treatise in 1615, but it was not published until 1620, after the Decree of the Congregation of the Index in 1616. The censorship of a previous work affected the text of Sphaera Mundi. Written at the request of his students, Biancani respectfully cited Brahe, Copernicus, Galileo, and Kepler repeatedly. He discussed the satellites of Jupiter and Saturn, sunspots, and the new stars of 1572, 1600, and 1604, astronomical phenomena not observed before the development of the telescope. Biancani wrote that God made the earth a perfect symmetrical world. The earth emerged on the third day of creation as a smooth sphere. God then created the depths of the sea and formed the mountains. By the hand of God, however, the earth would not be destroyed by water, but by fire. Biancani included a crude diagram of the moon, complete with very inaccurately placed craters. One of the many woodcuts in the text is the first illustration of a thermometer.

Printed on double pages. Includes eight hand-colored movable illustrations.

 

Each page has a surprise: three have movable parts, other pages include an aroma or an inset of fuzzy material, or two pockets with a penny inside, or the remnants of stick candy. Printed on leaved folded double, Japanese style. Color illustrations.

Produced by Uncle Ben Jay in collaboration with Emory I. Gondor. Contains moving parts and two pairs of 3-D viewing glasses. Stories include Cinderella, Rumplestiltskin, Sleeping Beauty, Chicken Little and others. Each page is illustrated in color by Tony Sarg. Each story has a movable, revolving picture which is tab operated.

This book of magic tricks includes a magic carpet, envelope and wand. The mechanics illustrate each trick. Instructions for each trick are in the back of the book. Moving parts include a box office with removable tickets and programs, removable Peter Rabbit portraits, a removable knife, hats, and more. The blue back board is illustrated with Peter and his tricks on stars and yellow clouds. The book is spiral-bound with red plastic.

 

 

Dorothy N. King

 

Help six cardboard animals go to the barnyard. Illustrations by William A. Koliker. Spiral bound pictorial boards hold French-fold pages.

 

Tippet’s Toy Store orders a crate of toys, but finds that they arrive headless. In another box are the toys’ heads. The reader helps the store owner attach the proper head to each body. Toys include a sailor, bear, clown, rabbit, soldier and three dolls. Is the fun in matching head to body or putting the heads with the wrong bodies?

 

Animation and illustration by Julian Wehr, including four full pages of farm animals that move with the pull of a tab. Spiral bound containing moveable parts.

Six movable plates animated by Julian Wehr. Spiral bound over boards.

“Little Red Riding Hood,” the famous story by Charles Perrault about a young girl’s encounter with a wolf, has changed considerably over the years and is still subject to numerous modern adaptations. The version in this book is number 333 in the Aarne-Thompson classification for fairy tales. From the Dunewald Printing Corporation’s “Blue Book Edition” series. Leaves with movable parts are double-folded. Spiral bound.

This is one of many books designed by Voitech Kubasta. The front and back cover illustrations are signed by Kubasta. A full-spread pop-up scene is at the end of the book. Printed by ARTIA, Prague, Czechoslovakia.

 

Adapted by A. Schenk from the original illustrations by E. H. Shepard. Lithographed in the United States by Dunewald Printing Corporation.

A National Geographic action book, this describes the activities of various animals from Arizona’s Sonoran Desert.

University of Utah copy gift of Ann Tapia Johnson (Parris)

“Follow the spooky skeleton through a houseful of scary pop-ups and pull-the-tab surprises, including a pull-out Mister Bones of your very own.” Paper engineer David Pelham studied at St Martin’s School of Art in the 1950s. He worked for several magazines such as The Ambassador, Studio International and Harper’s Bazaar, before joining Penguin Books as art director in 1968. Pelham is responsible for the distinctive Penguin paperback orange, blue or green spine and typographer Tschichold’s symbol at the top right corner on the front and back covers. He created the artwork for many of Penguin’s most memorable covers. He has won awards from the Designers and Art Directors Association of London and the Art Director’s Club of New York. He left Penguin Books in 1980. A published author and illustrator, he has created numerous movable books for children.

A counting book from one to ten, each page is filled with illustrations of confections, concocted and counted by mouse chefs. Along with pop-ups of the “cookies,” this book includes rhymed text and counting exercises.

Accompanied by a framed beetle.

Accompanied by a framed butterfly.

Includes more than thirty-five pop-ups.

Designed, engineered, and printed by the author. Issued in case with a miniature printing forme glued to it, the types in which spell out the book title. The booklet of three leaves with the title Stamp Album, contains two United States postage stamps showing a hand press and commemorating printing in America. Edition of forty copies.

The boards are connected by fan-folds. The views are through a door in the first boards. Edition of one hundred copies. University of Utah copy is no. 22.

Noted physician and biologist Lewis Thomas is most famous for his book of published essays, The Lives of the Cell, which won the National Book Award. Thomas called this collection of fourteen poems a combination of “…surrealism and biology.” Illustrated with etchings by Alfonso Ossorio (1916-1990). Printed on bifolia, attached end-to-end and folded accordion-style. Edition of one hundred and twenty copies, signed by the author and artist.

Edition of thirty-four numbered and signed copies. University of Utah copy is no. 28.

Six sonnets, each printed on a movable slip.

Illustrations by Peter H. Beaman and Elizabeth Whitely. Loose sheets cut to resemble a deck of playing cards, printed with the text on the obverse and reverse in playing-card fashion. Edition of six hundred copies, of which nos. 1-100 are signed by the author and the artist.

Designed and printed by Julie Chen. Edition of one hundred and twenty-five copies, numbered. University of Utah copy is no. 83.

The text of “Later” was written by Lois Morrison, who also illustrated, lettered, and bound this book. Two folding sections affixed to folded board cover, secured with string clasp. Edition of twenty-five copies. University of Utah copy is no. 22.

Text, illustrations, and binding by the author. Printed with a Gocco printer on distressed filter and cellophane paper, then hand-cut. Grommets allow the book to be hung on a cord which then turns the book into a necklace. The insects are spring debris from the author’s cabin. Seventeen variously shaped pieces are enclosed in a slotted paper case. Edition of twenty-five copies. University of Utah copy is no. 16.

The text is a condensed version of Ovid’s story. Printed with Cancun typeface on Tyvek and Strathmore’s 400 series drawing paper with a Gocco printer, gone back into with watercolor and ink. Handcut and bound in a variety of Japanese stencil papers. Edition of twenty-five copies, signed and numbered. University of Utah copy is no. 8.

Two flat boxes bound together. The text is in one box, paper cutout dolls in the other. Edition of eighteen copies, signed and numbered. University of Utah copy is no. 11.

Developed from an email from a woman in Chile to her father in the United States. Edition of twenty-five copies, signed and numbered. University of Utah copy is no. 13.

One folded leaf. Edition of twenty-five copies, signed and numbered. University of Utah copy is no. 25.

Edition of twenty-five numbered copies. University of Utah copy is no. 19.

Pop-up. Edition of six hundred copies.

One pop-up tower, with light bulb and battery.

Edition of forty copies.

 

Folded, with pop-out text.

A response to Rene Descartes’ Discours de la methode, published in Leyde in 1637.Silkscreened on Rives BFK 100% Rag printmaking paper. Produced for a traveling exhibition, “Science and the Artists’ Book,” produced jointly by the Smithsonian Institution Library and The Washington Project for the Arts. Issued in portfolio. Edition of twenty-five copies, signed by the artists.

Paul Johnson

Englishman Paul Johnson creates remarkable three-dimensional bookworks, collected by museums throughout the world. He has published several books on developing literacy through the book arts. Johnson is widely recognized for his pioneering work in this field.