Imageries (6 volumes)

Paris: Adrien Maeght Editeur [printed on the presses of Ateliers Arte Paris], 1982. French editions. Very Good. Six accordion-folding artist's books composed of cloth boards with color paper cover label and folding color lithographic interior, each in the publisher's lucite slipcase showing moderate shelfwear (1" crack in the slipcase for Cendrillon). All housed in the illustrated paper covered slipcase [16.5 cm x 18 cm] with quite a bit of peeling to the plastic veneer. Two of the edges have prominent splits. The books have been well preserved in their slipcases, lending them a fresh and bright appearance. Each book has a legend at the front. Le Petit Poucet (Tom Thumb), 1979; Blanche Neige (Snow White), 1974; Le Petit Chaperon Rouge (Little Red Riding Hood), 1965; La Fable du Hasard (The Fable of Hazard), 1968; La Belle au Bois dormant (Sleeping Beauty), 1982; Cendrillon (Cinderella), 1976.

Swiss-born Warja Lavater moved to New York City in 1958, where she began designing scientific illustrations for Dell Publishing Visual series. It was at this time that Honegger-Lavater came under the influence of American street advertising and began using pictograms as graphic representations of linguistic elements in her works. Her books often contain a legend listing the meanings of the various symbols. They then proceed chronologically, with the book unfolding, and the story being told entirely by using the symbols and no words.

Bright and colorful visual symbolic reinterpretations of these classic fairy tales, by the noted Swiss artist.