BOOK PLATES.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 239, 9 October 1935, Page 10

BOOK PLATES.

AUCKLAND EXHIBITION.

TO OPEN AT CITY" LIBRARY.

A loan exhibition of nearly 300 examples of book plate art representing 17 countries will be opened in the Auckland Library at 3 p.m. to-morrow by the deputy-Mayor, Mr. Bernard Martin. It has been arranged and hung; by tlifc Auckland bancli of the New Zealand ExLibris Society.

The display is drawn from the large collections of Mrs. Violet Wakelin, of Wellington, honorary secretary of the society, and of Miss Hilda Wiseman, of the Auckland branch of the society. Every phase of the art is represented in the collection, and many different tastes are shown. Some of the subjects are ancient, others most modern; some are laboriously serious, while others arc sketchy and fanciful. The plates vary in size from that of a cabinet photograph to that of a postage stamp. Many processes have been used to print them— typography, line process work, etching, aquatint, lithography and engraving 011 copper and wood. They are arranged to illustrate the national characteristics of each country.

No fewer than thirty-one New Zealand artisis are represented, the Aucklanders including Hilda Wiseman, C. Reginald Ford, Arnold F. Goodwin> Ronald Holloway, Tibor Donner and the late T. V. Gulliver. Among others that attract attention are the little black and gold plate of John Drinkwater, playwright and critic, and three beautiful allegorical designs by the Austrian artist, Von Bayros, reproduced in photogravure.

Everyone has heard of Captain do Groot, who made himself famous by cutting the ribbon at the opening of tlie Sydney Bridge. The plate bears a representation of the bridge, and a heraldic device, with the legend, "The sword is mightier than the scissors.' A section of the plates is devoted to wellknown persons. Among them is Princess Elizabeth of York, bearing a representation of her thatched play-cottage; oir Charles Kingsford Smith, the work.ol an Amerioan artist, George Hartley Brown; Lenin, a. portrait plate; and Ur. Benes, president of Czeclio-Slovakia. The exhibition will be open for a fortnight.