Beschreibung:

HOCKNEY, David -- CAVAFY, Constantine P. (1863-1933). Fourteen Poems . Translated by Nikos Stangos and Stephen Spender. London: Alecto, 1966. 2° (468 x 330mm). Signed etching laid in as issued. 12 etchings by Hockney stamped on the verso. (Tissue guards occasionally creased.) Original purple cloth, original black cloth slipcase (Small stains on the spine, the slipcase scuffed, soiled and faded).
HOCKNEY, David -- CAVAFY, Constantine P. (1863-1933). Fourteen Poems . Translated by Nikos Stangos and Stephen Spender. London: Alecto, 1966. 2° (468 x 330mm). Signed etching laid in as issued. 12 etchings by Hockney stamped on the verso. (Tissue guards occasionally creased.) Original purple cloth, original black cloth slipcase (Small stains on the spine, the slipcase scuffed, soiled and faded). ONE OF 250 COPIES SIGNED BY HOCKNEY, COMPLETE WITH THE SIGNED ETCHING 'Portrait of Cavafy II' loosely inserted. Hockney first encountered Cavafy through the writings of Lawrence Durrell, which prompted him to borrow an English edition of the poems from the Bradford public library in 1960; Hockney later admitted that he never returned the book. Cavafy was homosexual and many of his poems celebrate 'the beauty of deviate attractions'. Hockney had dealt with themes of gay love and desire as early as 1961, but in these early works the deliberately crude graffiti style obscures somewhat the nature of the scenes. In Fourteen Poems , however, Hockney employs a very different, representational style: his sparse, accurate line matching perfectly the clarity and simplicity of Cavafy's tone. The etchings were published in the year that Parliament finally de-criminalised homosexuality in England and Wales, but when the subject was still highly controversial. Copy 193 from 'Edition A' in an overall limitation of 650 copies.