Two Photographs of Anarchist Actions in Barcelona

(Anarchism) (Political Violence) Two Photographs. Barcelona: 1896 and 1902. One gelatin silver(?) print: 12 x 16.8 cm and one albumen print: 12.5 x 17.3 cm. Both mounted to heavier tan card, with substantial manuscript annotations recto, one stamped “Vista de Heridos y Demas Traumatismos / Del Hospital de la Sta. Cruz / Barcelona”. Verso with additional stamps and later annotations and signatures (by an administrator?) dated July 1906. Photos a bit worn, card on latter with some flaking and splitting, not affecting the image.

Scarce primary source documentation of early anarchist actions in Barcelona, a period of violent engagement that radicalized many Europeans. The earlier photograph documents 8 of the approx. 64 people wounded by the bombing of a Corpus Christi procession in Barcelona on June 7, 1896. Although no one claimed responsibility, municipal authorities and the police blamed militant anarchists and used the violence as a pretext to arrest and torture hundreds of anarchists and labor organizers, eventually sentencing five men to death at Montjuic. The real perpetrators were never found, and circumstantial evidence has led many to believe it was a false flag operation, since the bomb went off among the working-class crowd, rather than amongst the high-ranking politicians and church officials in the parade itself.

The second photograph documents wounded participants in Barcelona’s first general strike, in February 1902. The general strike evolved from an anarcho-syndicalist metal workers’ strike into a citywide work stoppage which eventually found working men and women, students, and the lower classes in pitched battles against the Spanish military. Hospital de la Santa Cruz was the destination for the strikers’ wounded and dead comrades.

$1500

La Protesta: Semanario de Batalla

(Nationalism) (Carlism) (Anti-Semitism) La Protesta: Semanario de Batalla. Radicalismo, Intransigencia, Nobleza, Sinceridad. Año I, Núm. 1. Barcelona, 1923. 49.6 x 34.5 cm, 4 pp., newsprint toned with creases at bifolds, small loss through full sheet at central crease, not affecting text.

First issue of an irregularly published radical monarchist (Carlist) paper, issued during the political crisis that led to General Miguel Primo de Rivera’s coup and dictatorship. Prefigures the cooperation of the Carlists with the fascists against the Second Republic with expressions of outrage against Spanish losses in Morocco, Catalan separatism, and the enemies of the “Sindicato Rojo” (the anarcho-syndicalist CNT etc.). Satirizes the campaign of a Jewish politician, Frederico Schwartz, and includes a brief panel on Schopenhauer’s fatal pessimism (but support of monarchism?).

Bold graphic design from the far-right. No copies of any issues in North America.

$325

La Argentina: A Collection of Photographs, Postcards, Programs, Reviews, and other Publications

(Dance) [Mercé, Antonia, “La Argentina”]; [Dora Kallmus, “Madame d’Ora”] and [Mary Elizabeth Gleason]. La Argentina: A Collection of Photographs, Postcards, Programs, Reviews, and other Publications, ca. 1928-1933.

An excellent group of primary source materials surveying the career of internationally renowned choreographer, dancer, and director, Antonia Mercé (1888-1936), known as La Argentina. Born in Buenos Aires, Mercé and her parents–both dancers–moved to Spain when she was a child; by the age of 11 she was a star ballerina at the Teatro Real de Madrid. She retired from ballet at 17 and began to study native Spanish folk dances. She has been described as an “assiduous ethnographer, combing Spain for rhythms, materials, and design concepts” and her interpretations of these dances, including bolero and flamenco, played an important role in the popularization and modernization of these forms. Living in Paris and with Sergei Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes as her model, she founded the company Les Ballets Espagnols, creating an avant-garde forum for Spanish dance and music. Her collaborative dance-theater productions “offered a modernist vision of a multinational Spain,” fusing classical Spanish ballet with Roma flamenco rhythms and legends.

In her friend Federico García Lorca’s words: “All the classical dances of this great artist are her unique signature, at the same time that they are the signature of her country, of my country.” Despite being awarded the French Légion d’honneur and dancing at the Roosevelt White House, her significant contributions to Spanish modern art and her position as the director of the largest ballet company in Paris (after Diaghilev’s death) were largely forgotten during the Franco dictatorship.

Most of the portraits in this collection were photographed by Dora Kallmus, a.k.a. Madame d’Ora, the Austrian-Jewish emigre whose Parisian studio was frequented by the Who’s Who of 1920s Parisian art and fashion: Coco Chanel, Colette, Pablo Picasso, and Josephine Baker, etc.

The clippings and programs were assembled by Mary Elizabeth Winbigler, née Gleason, an American dancer inspired by La Argentina who studied flamenco in Spain in the 1920s and performed in Madrid under the name “Marie Isabel” in 1931. When she returned to the US she organized a 50-member dance troupe who toured during the Depression, often performing as an opening act in movie theaters. The collection includes the typescript of a radio interview between Gleason and Argentina in 1935.

SOLD

Consisting of: Ten publicity postcards, all reproducing photographs of Argentina taken by d’Ora (five 10 x 14.5 cm, five 9 x 14.5 cm), one with holograph signature by Argentina, Madrid, 1931; three duplicates, two of the dupes with different programs advertised verso. Five programs: 1.) A Recital of Spanish Dances by La Argentina with Assistance of Carmencita Perez, Pianist, Pittsburgh: Nixon Theatre, December 11, 1928. Single sheet, folded 15 x 11.5 cm, with pictorial illus. on cover. 2.) Récital de Danse Espagnole donné par Mme Argentina avec le concours du pianiste Luis Galve, Paris, ca. 1933. 23.5 x 19.5 cm, [10] pp.; stapled pictorial wrapper with foiled rear wrap and decorative satin cord. 3.) Les Représentations de Madame Argentina avec sa troupe de Ballets Espagnols. Paris: Théâtre Marigny, July 1929. 27 x 22 cm, [34] pp.; profusely illus. incl. 4 b/w plates tipped in. Stapled color illustrated wrapper with decorative satin cord and original glassine overlay (now darkened). Gleason’s copy of this exceptional program exemplifies the height of Argentina’s success with her Ballets Espagnols. With a single sheet program tipped in for a Vincente Escuedro flamenco recital at Severance Hall, Cleveland, 1932. 4.) Two copies of Hommage a La Argentina par Nana de Herrera, Paris: Grande Salle Pleyel, 18 Juillet 1941. 25 x 21.5 cm, decorative satin cord binding, covers with full-page reproduction of d’Ora studio image of La Argentina. One copy lightly foxed in one corner, the other with a small closed tear at spine. Seven vintage publicity photos: gelatin silver prints, six approx. 16.5 x 22.5 cm, one 13 x 11.5 cm; five signed d’Ora in negative, two photographs by Madrid studio photographers, known to be used in advertisements ca. 1935. Folder of clippings: approx. 16 items from English and Spanish language sources, with articles about La Argentina and images, including reproductions of her costumes. Radio Script for WTAM, Cleveland: 4 pp. typescript of interview between Mary Elizabeth Gleason and La Argentina broadcast on Monday, November 4, 1935, discussing modern dance and La Argentina’s Order of Isabella award [the first woman to be so honored?] shortly before La Argentina’s untimely death. Together with Gleason’s copy of: Levinson, André, La Argentina: Essai sur la danse espagnole avec 32 reproductions en phototypie. Paris: Éditions des Chroniques du Jour, 1928. No. 259 from 365. French self-wrappers separating from text block, pages starting. With Mary Elizabeth Gleason’s bookplate.

See Ninotchka Devorah Bennahum, Antonia Merce, La Argentina: Flamenco and the Spanish Avant Garde, Wesleyan University Press, 2000.

Tórtola Valencia: Photographs, Programs, Ex-Libris and other Documents

Tórtola Valencia: Photographs, Programs, Ex-Libris and other Documents, 1915-1954.

Though the Spanish-born, British-raised early modern dancer Tórtola Valencia (1882-1955) is rarely discussed in English-language histories, in the 1910s and 1920s “[she] was considered one of the outstanding solo dancers of the period.” Contemporary reviews embraced Tórtola as an innovator with favorable comparisons to Isadora Duncan and Maud Allan. Scholars have speculated that she is often forgotten because her career flourished primarily in Latin America (her third tour there lasted five years). Her well documented engagement with indigenous cultures in Chile, El Salvador, Mexico, and Peru included the study of ceramics, textiles, and music, which were incorporated into her choreography and sets. As a queer woman, the sensuality of her performances and a lifestyle of “occultism” and vegetarianism brought her additional scrutiny later in life, in fascist Spain after 1938.

This group of documents explores various aspects of her identity and self-presentation, which was famously multicultural and adaptive: “In her twenty-two year career, from 1908 to her abrupt retirement in 1930, she ceaselessly toured the main theaters of Europe, North America, and Latin America.[...] In the places where she performed, poets and painters were routinely encouraged by local governments to produce artworks commemorating her visit [...] Moreover, Tórtola herself was a collector as well as a dancer, which makes her a crucial figure for thinking about the circulation of culture in the modernist period via artists on tour; what she collected were artifacts, costumes, cultural ideas, and clippings, and through performances that built on those collections, she offered an image of dance’s struggle to engage with other contemporary cultures and their prehistories.”

One of her most unlikely achievements was the premiere, in 1925, of an Incan Warrior Dance in Lima, during the “Fiesta de la Raza.” Based on the story of the “last” Incan king, Huayna Capac, and set to Incan flute music, the performance received “rapturous reviews, an article in El Comercio (September 19, 1925) stands out with [its] emphasis on the dancer’s capacity to connect different cultures [...] ‘[W]hy should it be a surprise that her soul should also have opened itself to that of our glorious Inca race?’ [...]Tórtola’s publicity photograph for the event would continue to circulate—as the planned frontispiece for an English-language book on Inca civilization that was never published, and far more importantly, as the centerpiece in Peru’s exhibition at the 1929 Panamerican Exhibition in Seville.”

Tórtola carefully constructed her own legend, claiming to be the daughter of an Andalusian gypsy, as well as the barefoot inspiration for Nicaraguan poet Rubén Dario’s ”La bailarina de los pies desnudos.” During her retirement in Franco’s Spain, her sexuality required another fiction: she adopted her longtime companion, Ángeles Magret-Vilá, who became her heir.

As a ceaseless creator of her own public image, Tórtola was known to hand color her publicity photos and draw ideas for her costumes and sets. She also designed ex-libris for her friends. This group features three examples of photographs hand colored by Tórtola and signed in dedication to a friend, with an accompanying letter written by Margret-Vilá. It also includes a rare example of the studio photographs Tórtola made in Lima to commemorate “La danza incaica guerrera.” The scarce prints are the only surviving documentation of this important work and its pioneering visual palimpsest of Incan identity and music in dance.

SOLD

Consisting of:

Tortola Valencia. Barcelona: Thomas, nd., ca. 1917-1918. 27.5 x 19 cm, [32] pp.; publicity book, illus. throughout, with an annotated list of 42 of her dances and excerpts of reviews from her North and South American tours, 1915-1917; in illus. stapled self-wrappers, central sheet separated, rest loose, some edges with closed tears. Not found in OCLC. Three programs from ‘El Dorado’ theater, Barcelona, 1917-1918. All near 16.5 x 12 cm, two single-fold illustrated programs, the third [48] pp; the two former reproducing poems, one by Ruben Dario, the other by Francisco Villaespesa; the third illustrating the full program of dancers for the 1917-1918 season, including La Argentina, Raquel Meller, Amalia Molina, etc., and reproductions of the sets, by painter Juan Morales. Very Good. Not found in OCLC. La Pelicula: Revista popular ilustrada, Año I, Num 1 (June 1915). Madrid, et al. Cover illustration of Tórtola, toned and frayed. The first issue of an otherwise unrecorded? silent film review. Three hand colored publicity photos: each approx. 23.5 x 17 cm, dated in plates 1915-1918, with holograph inscriptions dedicated to Luis Santamarina, together with a single page holograph letter on monogrammed stationery written by Margret-Vilá to Luis Santamarina describing the images “iluminadas por ella misma [Tórtola] en la actualidad.” Papers with chipped edges, not affecting the images, dampstain at the edge of two of the photos, one at blank edge affecting approx 1 x 20 mm of hte print, the other 1.5 x 9 cm. Vivid and extremely scarce self-representations, despite imperfect conditions. Vintage photograph of Tórtola and painter Ignacio Zuloaga, Sitges, n.d. approx. 16 x 16 cm. Vintage Publicity photograph of “La danza incaica guerrera,” n.d. [ca. 1925], 22.5 x 16 cm, near fine, multiple numeric pencil notations verso. Five Ex-Libris by Tórtola for Dr. Juan Catasús, 1954, four 11 x 9 cm, one slightly smaller, very good. One Ex-Libris Tórtola Valencia, 12 x 9 cm, undated. Three monograms, from drawings by Tórtola, clipped from larger sheets, undated.

Clayton, M. (2012). Touring History: Tórtola Valencia Between Europe and the Americas. Dance Research Journal 44(1), 28-49.

See also:

Garland, I. (1997). Early Modern Dance in Spain: Tórtola Valencia, Dancer of the Historical Intuition. Dance Research Journal 29(2), 1-22; and Mitchel Snow, K. (2020). A Revolution in Movement: Dancers, Painters, and the Image of Modern Mexico. University of Florida Press.

1a Exposició de Cartells [...] Internacionals en Previsió dels Accidents de Treball

(Graphic Design) (Worker Safety) (Expositions) Generalitat de Catalunya, Conselleria de Treball; and Marti Bas, Illus. Calendar commemorating the 1a Exposició de Cartells Nacionals i Internacionals en Previsió dels Accidents de Treball. Barcelona: 1937. 23.5 x 16.6 cm; 52 weekly calendar sheets printed recto, each sheet illustrating a different international worker safety poster with explanations of the dangers represented in each, in Catalan. Sheets loose, neatly removed from their original perforated(?) binding, the final week mounted to a heavier card stock, weeks 43 and 46 with small losses to blind top edge where removed from binding. Orig. color cover present, illus. by Marti Bas, lightly foxed on blank verso, not affecting recto. Together with a second calendar: Generalitat de Catalunya, Conselleria de Treball. [Croada de La Previsio 1937]: [Commemoració de la 1a Exposició de Cartells Nacionals i Internacionals en Previsió dels Accidents de Treball…]. Barcelona: 1937. [Fotolitografia Barguño]. 11.4 x 7.7 cm. [8] pp., single sheet, tri-fold monthly calendar with 14 illus. Both VG+.

Appealing, otherwise unrecorded, artifacts of a graphic design exhibition organized during the Spanish Civil War by the Catalonian Ministry of Labor, probably in conjunction with the UGT (General Workers Union). The weekly calendar surveys 52 dramatic, often frightening, international accident prevention posters (incl. the workplace dangers of alcohol, electrical shocks; eye safety; braking; cranes, ladders, fire, slips and falls, heavy lifting, cables, scaffoldings, scalding, sharp tools, sewing machines, etc.). Examples drawn from safety campaigns in Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Japan, The Netherlands, Norway, Poland, and the U.K. (Strange bedfellows given the political realities of many of these countries in January 1937!)

The safety posters themselves were probably the product of union efforts in individual countries, not necessarily by governmental organizations or propaganda offices. They underscore the dangerous and inhumane conditions that many laborers faced twenty years after the creation of the ILO in the Treaty of Versailles (1919). Occupational health and safety policy would not be nationally regulated in most of these countries for another thirty to forty years.

Cover illustration by artist Marti Bas, known for his work on other civil war-era posters and propaganda programs.

We are unable to find records of another copy of the weekly calendar in OCLC or market records, such as they are. The smaller, monthly calendar is known from other examples, but is also not listed in OCLC holdings.

$1750

Eight Spanish Republican Women’s Groups’ Handbills and Flyers

(Anarcho-Feminism) (Guerra Civil) (Suffrage) (Songs) [Agrupación Mujeres Libres; La Secció Femenina del Bloc Obrer i Camperol; Las Agrupaciones Femeninas del Partido Radical, et al.]. Eight Republican Women’s Groups Handbills and Flyers, ca. 1934-1938. Np, nd. [Barcelona, Madrid, et al.]. Various sizes ranging from 31.5 x 22 to 16.5 x 16.5 cm; all but one printed recto only, fragile papers with minor fraying and small closed tears or nicks throughout. One green paper foxed. One illustrated, linocut?

Rare ephemera from various Republican women’s political organizations during the Spanish Second Republic and the Civil War, these handbills express outrage with the failures of certain political leaders and parties, and appeal to women to vote (as proletariat workers; domestic laborers, and mothers). Women’s suffrage was established in 1933; these examples attempt to enlist their support for the FAI and CNT, Catalonian Independence, and voluntary military service, among other issues.

One important sheet contains two coplas (folk songs) first published in the anarcho-feminist “Mujeres Libres” magazine: “El sambenito” and “Alto la Revolución.” These represent the complexity and despair of the counter-revolutionary movements building at the end of the Civil War.

None of the present examples are recorded in OCLC collections.

$1200

Aire. No. 1 (Junio 1937) through No. 4 (Primavera 1938) (all published)

Aire. No. 1 (Junio 1937) through No. 4 (Primavera 1938) (all published). Barcelona: N.p., 1937-1938. 4to, 12-1/2 x 9-3/8 in., four issues: [48], [72], [74], [76] pp.; full-page illustrations throughout, incl. b/w reproductions, experimental typography and design, numerous multicolored printing techniques, with overlays and varied papers, corners bumped with a few creases and scattered toning to interior, No. 1 with a small loss to blank edge on two leaves not affecting text or images. No. 4 with small dampstain to blank fore corner on a few central leaves. Spiral-bound color pictorial wraps, No. 1 with short closed tear to front wrap, Nos. 2 and 4 a bit foxed and worn at the edges and wire.

A complete run of “one of the most luxurious and visually dynamic publications of the [Spanish Civil] war.” This short-lived avant-garde aviation serial was published during the war under the direction of the Republican Air Force. The contents are antifascist and literary, promoting solidarity with the Popular Front, the USSR, and Mexico. Wartime aviation news is interspersed with articles on artistic and cultural topics, poetry, photo essays, and advertisements. The first issue’s somber and poetic epigraph belies the exuberant graphics: “Al hombre le nacieron alas … Cuando conquisto el cielo, quiso destruir la tierra.”

Artist Salvador Ortiga, known for his political graphics, was responsible for the dramatic covers and probably much of the design. Ortiga was arrested at the end of the war and died in a notorious Nationalist prison camp in 1939.

An oft-cited highlight of Guerra Civil print culture, rare complete. OCLC lists three North American holdings: UI-UC, UPenn, and Princeton.

See Jordan Mendelson, Revistas y Guerra, 1936-1939, Museo Reina Sofia, Madrid, 2007.

$2500

Porvenir: Revista Infantil. Nos. 1-11, 13

(Children’s Literature) (Guerra Civil) (Anarchism) (Francesc Ferrer i Guàrdia) Ediciones F.R.E.R. [Federación Regional de Escuelas Racionalistas de Cataluña]. Porvenir: Revista Infantil. Nos. 1-11, 13. Barcelona: 1937-1938. 12 issues (lacking no. 12), nos. 1-9 each 22 x 31.5 cm, nos. 10-13 each 19.5 x 29.5 cm; nos. 1-5 with [8] pp., nos. 6-13 with [10]-[12] pp.; color illustrations throughout; color self-wrappers, loose as issued, a few originally stapled; papers lightly toned at edges, no. 3 with one page darkened and frayed at fore edge, no. 4 covers separated with closed tears at edges and some flaking, no. 11 small ink manuscript annotation on blank edge of front wrap.

A near complete run of a rare children’s serial, published in castellano for the thousands of rearguard Republican children sheltering in Barcelona during the civil war. The publishing entity, FRER, was a federation of rationalist schools based on the Escuela Moderna pedagogy of anarchist educator Francesco Ferrer. During the Civil War FRER was led by the anarchist Benjamín Cano Ruiz, who concluded that refugee children urgently needed a counterpoint to the militaristic storytelling and propaganda emerging from the Republican government and communist (i.e. Soviet-influenced) social organizations.

Cano oversaw the “Respect Children” campaign led by the FAI/Juventudes Libertarias and created tremendous publicity for Porvenir by emphasizing the importance of play and craft, children’s own storytelling, and fantasy and observation over didactic, antifascist exercises. The magazine sponsored many writing competitions for prose, poems, and theatrical works by children.

Contributing artists included illustrators well-known for their graphic work on FAI/CNT graphics: Gumersindo Sainz Morales de Castilla, aka “Gumsay” and Tomás Vera Morales, aka “Esbelt”. Another fantastic cover by the artist Luis Vidal Molné and many issues largely attributed to woman cartoonist Mari Batlle, who became known in the 1950s for her artwork in girl’s comics.

A Catalan-language edition, Pervenir, ceased after the first 4 issues. Only single-issue holdings of either edition in OCLC institutions: IISG in Amsterdam (Porvenir, no. 8) and University of Barcelona (Pervenir, no. 1).

SOLD

COLLECTION OF PROPAGANDA PHOTOGRAPHS OF THE SECCIÓN FEMENINA

40 silver gelatin prints: 36 approx. 5 x 7”, near fine, all stamped verso identifying two SS-PK photographers, [Bruno] Wisniewski and Ege, some with a “Sachregister” stamp and numbered pencil annotations verso; 3 smaller, approx. 3 x 4”, good; one 4 x 6” mounted to toned card, rubbed with a few scratches.

The Sección Femenina [SF] was officially recognized by General Franco following the end of the Spanish Civil War in 1939. Its mandate was to organize and educate women to be full participants in the reconstruction of the nation according to Falangist/fascist principles. To this end the SF had to reconcile politically conservative and religious (Catholic) doctrine with the modern social realities of the 1940s. It found itself in the awkward position of arguing strongly for the higher education of women and girls while rejecting “feminist intellectualism”. Similarly, it had to promote the ideal woman at home while providing a model for women whose membership in the workforce was an economic necessity.

The model of ideal femininity central to this mission had to be flexible enough to contain these contradictions. The photos in this collection exemplify this elastic image of womanhood, depicting SF leaders and members engaged in the wide variety of activities promoted by the organization. These include history and music classes, field hockey, cooking, sewing, childcare, and patriotic events. As a group they reflect the inherent ambivalence of the SF: an independent and powerful network of educated women that offered its members “an unusual level of public activism, both professionally and politically”, while preaching traditional ideology.

The Nazi Waffen-SS Propagandakopanien (SS-PK) was formed in 1938 to provide wartime propaganda to domestic German audiences. SS-PK photographers were embedded in armed divisions and diplomatic corps; these photos of the Sección Femenina were probably taken between October 1940 (when Hitler and Franco met in southern Spain) and late 1941, when relations between the two countries deteriorated as it became clear Spain would not officially enter the war. The names of the two photographers appear in other SS-PK records.

$2250

Illustrated Autograph Album: El Frente de Juventudes Femenino a su Regidora Comarcal

(Education - Girls) (Fascism) [El Frente de Juventudes Femenino, Villanueva y Geltrú]. Illustrated Autograph Album: El Frente de Juventudes Femenino a su Regidora Comarcal. June 1943. Oblong 19.5 x 31 cm, 97 manuscript leaves; including approx. 90 pages individually executed by members of the Juventudes Femenino, approx. 90 with brightly colored pencil and pen drawings accompanying various inscriptions, poems, songs, and signatures; stab bound in brown faux-leather boards with leather thread, leather broken thus loosening the album, otherwise very good. With two leaves laid in, these two a bit frayed where they extended beyond the boards.

Unique illustrated gift album for Sra. Mercedes Rodriguez, a regional commander of the Falange Party’s Girls Youth Front, commemorating a political indoctrination summer camp focusing on home economics, physical education, religion, and social hygiene. During the Civil War, El Frente de Juventudes (like its fascist counterparts Hitlerjugend [Germany] and Balilla [Italy]) became an important part of securing a fascist future. Following the Nationalist victory, Franco made voluntary and involuntary state-sponsored youth organizations a priority of his new government, providing militarized style training for both boys and girls. Loosely based on scouting troops, the girls sections (“Margaritas” for 7-10 yr olds; “Flechas” for 10-18 yr olds) wore uniforms and practiced the songs and policies of the new Homeland.

Later superseded by the Juventudes de la Sección Femenina (1945), the Margaritas and Flechas of 1943 were being prepared to be good wives and mothers to the soldiers of Spain: in addition to domestic skills (sewing, nursing, cooking, etc.), they were encouraged to be physically fit, hygienic, churchgoers capable of teaching the core Falange values (Dios, Patria, Hogar) to the next generation.

In detailed drawings and inscriptions, the album documents the language and imagery of this indoctrination and its eerie combination of idealized femininity, children’s comics, and facist propaganda. Again and again Margaritas and Flechas announce their dedication to their beloved (“cariño”) commander, obedience to the political hierarchy of the Falange (“a tus ordenes”), and submission to the collective goals of national syndicalism. ¡Arriba España!

Despite its wide integration into girls education for more than thirty years, El Frente de Juventudes Femenino and the Juventudes de la Sección Femenina are poorly documented in North American institutions.

$2250

Elezioni Politiche 1913. Noi Anarchici.

(Anarchism) Elezioni Politiche 1913. Noi Anarchici … Broadside, 13 x 18-½ in.; creased, bottom edge roughly trimmed, typographic irregularities. Np, nd [1912-1913].

Anarchist broadside protesting the quasi-universal male suffrage granted to Italian men over 30 by the “moderately progressive” government of Giovanni Giolitti in 1912. The enfranchisement extended the vote to the very poor and illiterate, with the dramatic impact of trebling the electorate (from 3 to almost 9 million voters) in advance of the 1913 elections. The far left parties (Estrema) did not support the franchise; here anarchists protest it as a bourgeois “swindle,” keeping intact economic tyranny and solidifying the power of the political elite.

Italian anarchists were influenced by Mikhail Bakunin, who wrote “the whole system of representative government is an immense fraud resting on this fiction [of political liberty in the popular vote] ... Political power means domination.” (In fact, the “democratized” 1913 elections resulted in no representative gains by the revolutionary or working class parties of Estrema.)

$175

Primo Congresso Nazionale, 26 27 Aprile 1919. Donne di Roma [...]

(Women’s Organizations) (WWI) (Mothers and Widows) Associazione Nazionale Fra Le Madri e Le Vedove Dei Caduti. Primo Congresso Nazionale, 26 27 Aprile 1919. Donne di Roma,—. Roma: Tip. Italiana di Pubblicità, 1919. Broadside, printed recto only, 98 x 67 cm, fragile at creases.

Early political organizing by Italian women in an impassioned announcement for the first congress of mothers and widows of the fallen soldiers of WWI. The gathering was not only to acknowledge the great personal losses of these women, but to form a “definitive structure” with which they hoped to address urgent civic and economic problems faced by those who had “given their blood and their love for the greatness of the sacred family … Italy!” The poster calls for “better state measures.”

Very little is written about this organization in the pre-fascist period, but the association continues to organize in the 1920s.

Not in OCLC.

$450

L’Opera Nazionale Maternità ed Infanzia nel suo costante lavoro per la difesa [...]

(Women and Children) (Fascist Demographics) (Eugenics) Opera Nazionale per la Protezione della Maternità ed Infanzia, Federazione Provinciale di Lucca. L’Opera Nazionale Maternità ed Infanzia nel suo costante lavoro per la difesa ed il miglioramento della razza …. Lucca: Tip. Francesconi e Simonetti, 1933 [XI]. Broadside, printed recto only, 100 x 69.5 cm, a few small losses to edges, a few offset roller marks on right edge.

An impressive example from a public campaign in support of Mussolini’s “Battle for Births,” one of the pillars of his vision for Italian economic supremacy. His regime supported the demographic policy with financial incentives, including tax breaks and direct grants, like those described here, for large families and married couples. Conversely, Italians could be penalized for not having sufficient children–the ideal number was more than 5–or remaining unmarried. As signaled in this example by the proposed goal of “improving of the breed,” Italian pronatalist policies under Mussolini can be traced to the eugenics movement.

No other examples found in market or institutional holdings.

$450

La Dattilografa: Canzone a ballo

(Women; Typists) (Operetta) Rocchi-Burlamacchi, G. La Dattilografa: Canzone a ballo. Florence: Mignani, 1939 [XVII].

Sheet music, 27 x 18.2 cm, [4] pp.; pictorial color self-wrapper. Cover sl. toned, very good.

A bit of social satire from fascist Italy in this suggestive song (for dancing!) about typists and their machines.

Not found in OCLC.

SOLD

Attenzione! Si avvicinano i “liberatori” anglo-assassini…

(Propaganda - Fascist) Attenzione! Si avvicinano i “liberatori” anglo-assassini… [Milan?], nd., ca. 1943. Poster printed in black and red, approx. 22-¾ x 19-¼ in.; toned, creases from vertical and horizontal folds, splitting at center; edges a bit worn, some foxing verso.

Poster warning inhabitants in German-controlled northern Italy of the dangers of the advancing Allied forces. “Reds,” “Jews,” and “hyenas of the air,” are coming for Italian women and children, converting them to their side with sweets and cigarettes.

OCLC locates one holding, at the Hoover.

$225

La Navassa: Organo di sfottimento dei dep centrati a Tagliolo. Anno I, Nos. 1; 3-6.

(Clandestine Press) (Antifascism) (Satire) La Navassa: Organo di sfottimento dei dep centrati a Tagliolo. Anno I, N. 1 and N. 3-6. Tagliolo, Italy: 1944-1945. 5 of 6 issues, each approx. 40 x 32.5 cm, 6-8 pp., mimeograph from type- and manuscript, printed recto only, each folio folded once and stapled along open edge, leaving inner pages blank; original artwork and hand coloring on nos. 5 and 6. Chronology of nos. 4 and 5 reversed (addressed by editor in issue no. 4). Relatively heavy paper presumably drawn from diminished wartime stocks, perhaps intended for commercial use, now somewhat toned with fraying/chipping at edges, central creases.

Nearly complete run of an antifascist satirical published clandestinely during the final six months of the Italian Resistance in the Piedmont region, part of the German-occupied Italian Social Republic. Printed in the Tagliolo-Monferrato comune, known for its wines, the title is derived from a word in the local dialect for a wooden tub used for collecting and pressing grapes. In the first issue, the pseudonymous editors described their intention to use the paper as a “crucible” to release a “juice rich in spirit and good humor.”

Satirical poems, fiction, theater scripts, comics, and columns discuss local politics and village news while referencing the occupation and the economic hardships of war; many absurdist entries on art, women’s fashion, drinking, and licentious themes of village life. Reports on partisan actions in the area, including a Nazi ambush near Genoa. The final issue (No. 6: May 1, 1945) was dedicated to the liberation of Italy, the execution of Mussolini, and the denunciation of regional fascists. Overall a relatively ambitious production considering contemporary material shortages, the penalties for printing outside of the official Salo Republic propaganda system, and the problems of audience and distribution.

We speculate that the publication may have been produced by tenant winegrowers in Tagliolo, since there are frequent criticisms of the castle and the “commander” of the winery. These laborers ask for parity in treatment with their colleagues in nearby wine zones, including Campo Ligure. The editors’ antifascist sentiment is characteristic of the general population’s participation in the resistance near the end of the war, when communities and individuals responded to highly localized events and conditions in the Salo Republic rather than to specific political philosophies of the partigiani. Although military actions and martyrs of the resistance are discussed, its satirical tone represents the broader purpose of antifascist underground media in WWII: building solidarity and lifting spirits.

Italian WWII clandestine materials are under-represented in major institutional collections of underground and illegal press activities. Not recorded in OCLC member holdings or in specific research holdings related to the resistance in Italy, for example the Bibliographic Research Center at Torino University, the Italian Catalog of Periodicals, the ICCU/OPAC, and the Piedmontese Institute for the History of the Resistance.

SOLD

Donne piemontesi nella lotta di liberazione 99 partigiane cadute, 185 deportate, 38 cadute civili

Gobetti, Ada, Intro. Donne piemontesi nella lotta di liberazione 99 partigiane cadute, 185 deportate, 38 cadute civili. Turin, Italy: Torino Commissione femminile dell’ A.N.P.I. provinciale di Torino, nd. [ca. 1945]. 24 cm, 103 pp.; many b/w portraits, wrappers darkened and a bit worn, small ink numeric notation on front cover.

Haunting commemoration of women partisans in the Italian Resistance, with portraits, personal testimony, extensive biographical details, information about individual service and military action, and battle recollections. Includes many reproductions of letters and clandestine flyers and newsletters by the women’s resistance groups Gruppi di defesa della donne and La Difesa della Lavoratrice, as well as the Corpo Volontari della Liberta. The list of deported women is mostly Jewish, and includes girls as young as 9.

OCLC lists North American holdings at Harvard, NYPL, and Princeton.

$350

Mezzo cielo: Il giornale della lega delle donne comuniste italiane. Anno I, Nos. 1-2; Anno II, No. 1

(Women’s Liberation) (Communism) Lega delle donne comuniste italiane. Mezzo cielo: Il giornale della lega delle donne comuniste italiane. Anno I, Nos. 1-2; Anno II, No. 1. Milano: Lega delle donne comuniste italiane, 1973-1975. Three of six numbers, issued irregularly from late 1973-1975 (calling itself a trimestral). Sizes vary, tabloid to 4to. Illus throughout, incl b/w repros from photographs of events etc., also some comics, and original graphics. Stapled color pictorial wrappers. Inaugural issue with heavy center crease, rubbed. No. 2 (March 1974) closed tear on front cover.

Three issues (the first two together with the final number) of a well designed magazine professing women’s liberation through class struggle and labor emancipation. Articles on contemporary social issues and national events and strikes, in addition to reporting on “women’s issues” including health care, childcare, and education.

No OCLC holdings in North America, a few scattered issues in Europe, a single presumed complete run at IISH.

$425

Skema. Mensile fotografico d’attualità. (All published).

Skema. Mensile fotografico d’attualità. Anno I, No. 1 (November 1969) through Anno VI, No. 12 (December 1974) (all published). Bologna: [ALFA Farmaceutici], 1969-1974.

Comprising a complete run of a rare Italian photographic serial with poster-sized color inserts designed and distributed in association with ALFA Farmaceutici. Monographic issues cover social, cultural, or political themes relevant to this tumultuous period in world history; each introduced by famous Italian public intellectuals, journalists, politicians, scientists, artists, and writers. Including Umberto Eco, Federico Fellini, Gianni Agnelli, and Gillo Dorfles.

Skema was a forum for unmediated photographic storytelling loosely modeled on the anti-realist movement Gruppo 63. In the first issue the editors state “ideas will be directly and freely provided by images: a medium that suffers from fewer alterations.” Echoing some of the experimentalist manifestos of Il Verri, Skema’s editors criticized the perceived transparency of language, freeing meaning to be made instead in the mind of the “viewer.” “Words will remain at the bottom,” with captions and textual interpretation only where world events “most deeply dug a furrow, or a wound, on the crust of common beliefs.”

The eye-catching covers, unusual photographic spreads, and striking color inserts were the responsibility of designer Marco Caroli. Together with editor Franco Vanni, they created a unique visual language juxtaposing international photojournalism, modern infographics, and quotable short form essays in a section called “di parere.”

Topical issues included protest movements, drugs, feminism, avantgarde theater, and Vietnam. But many were also dedicated to scientific and economic aspects of the difficult period that followed Italy’s “economic miracle”: hunger, prisons, agriculture, space, housing, the elderly, divorce, computers, mafia, circus, ecology, China, Latin America, propaganda, anthropology, and a few on single artists or philosophers: Irinia Ionesco, Ghitta Carell, Pablo Picasso, Diderot, and Galileo; among the photojournalism are press photos of installation art, Pop, and assemblage by artists including Wolf Vostell, Andy Warhol, and Ed Kienholz.

The scarcity of complete runs and bibliographic study has led to confusion about Skema’s origins. It is not, as it is often described, a progressive publication with independent social criticism. Instead, it is a deft work of appropriation: produced by Alfa as a promotional tool for its medical and biotech clientele. Skema’s inventive design and forward-looking reporting were a creative and subtle advertisement that was discontinued when production became too expensive. We speculate that Skema was the brainchild of Alfa’s founder, Marino Golinelli, listed in early issues as a member of the editorial board. Later Golinelli became an important collector of contemporary art and a celebrated philanthropist supporting projects in education, arts, and the sciences.

These experimental artistic attitudes were brought to bear on the cataclysmic socio-economic changes affecting lived realities in Italy and abroad. In the case of Skema, they reflect an increased demand for cultural consumption from a new Italian middle class, and the growing sophistication of bourgeois taste.

Scarce. OCLC finds one complete run at the University of Rome. A few scattered issues recorded in British, European, and North American holdings (UCSD and UCLA).

$4500

62 numbers in 58 fascicules, plus two supplements (to Anno III, no. 2 and Anno V, no. 10), Issues range from 60-74 pp., early issues almost exclusively illustrated, reproducing b/w photographs from Italian and international press agencies, including ANSA, Farabola, Publifoto, Keystone, Liverani, Lehtikuva, UPI, and AP among many. Later issues with up to 20 pp. of text on orange newsprint. About 30 issues with color inserts or advertisements offered as a “manifesto” or “regalo una stampa a colori,” some in poster format (unfolded: 22 ½ x 15 ¾ in.), others small bound-in half-page pamphlets, or full-page vintage Fiat ads. Some toning as expected, illustrated wrappers somewhat rubbed, scattered creasing and rounding at corners. Many stamped internally “Omaggi ALFA Farmaceutici [...]” Small loss to front wrap of Anno. I, No. 1. Lacking five inserts or advertisements as follows: Anno II, Nos. 4 and 13; Anno III, No. 7; Anno IV, No. 3; and Anno V, no. 12.