Another way to think of the signing of a thing is in the ‘Ex Libris’ way as in ‘this is my thing and by my marking it I am making it so.’ Ex Libris, as I’m sure you know, is Latin for ‘from the library of’. In fact there is an entire subset of the collecting world whose focus is on acquiring the graphic images some bibliophiles use to mark their books. People commission or create for themselves a decorative device to use as a book-plate in conjunction with their name perhaps.
My maternal grandmother Constance Cozzens Milton (I am David Cozzens Bond) would often sign the frontispiece in lieu of a decorative device. Now she would also write other messages therein and often place other paper ephemera in the pages of said volume with the intention of creating further context, I guess, for later readers. She would put related newspaper articles between pages which ironically, for someone who cared deeply about books and reading, would ruin the adjoining pages. So sad but it’s sort of her legacy to me, ruined old books.
I have as part of my collection some great examples of Natalia Gontcharova signing in an Ex Libris way. This is not really the ‘weaponized’ signature I mentioned previously, there is no power conferred, but simple the marking of a thing in order to claim ownership. I have ten editions of Dancing Times from 1938/39 and eight copies of the French periodical L’Illustration from 1932. Written across the top of each of these magazines is her home address of 19 rue Jacques-Callot Paris as well as her signature N. Gontcharova. So great for studying and comparing and as Alice Karle has pointed out previously, so instructive and illuminating to see things she had in her daily life.
Also in my collection is a hand done book-plate affixed to the front page of a large format book of costume designs for a 1932 production by Mikhail Chekhov of ‘Ivan the Terrible’ which was staged in Riga, Latvia and Kaunas, Lithuania. The Ex Libris is more or less ‘L’ shaped and features her Cyrillic initials N and G intertwined with leafy vines and gourds. It’s an extremely lovely and delicate thing and would seem to indicate the seriousness with which she took the project. Interestingly, while the production itself is recorded in the history books, whether the costumes were by Gontcharova is not. Have you ever heard of this production? Seen any images? Please let me know if you can contribute.
Yorumlar