Photobook Auction Watch

Monday, April 27, at 10 am, Doyle New York will be hosting an auction of RARE BOOKS, AUTOGRAPHS & PHOTOGRAPHS. There are quite a few interesting photographs but of particular interest to me are the seven photobooks up for auction. As I wrote previously, if the economic downturn gets worse, prices should start dropping. I'm curious to see how these books will do, as a bellwether before the May 14 Swann Galleries auction of Photographic Literature and Fine Photographs.

These are the books:

AARONS, SLIM, A Wonderful Time: An intimate portrait of the good life. Harper and Row, [1974]. Estimate $300-400

BRASSAI, Paris de nuit. Editions "Arts et Metiers Graphiques," n.d. (1933). Missing one page. Estimate $300-500

CARTIER-BRESSON, HENRI. America in Passing. Little, Brown, 1991. + CARTIER-BRESSON, RATNA. Nos ombres en fete. N,p., 1990. One of 250 copies with a small original Cartier-Bresson photograph (taken in 1937) tipped-in at the end of the text. + And four other pamphlets. All six items are inscribed by Cartier-Bresson to Lincoln Kirstein. Estimate $400-600

DENBY, EDWIN. In Public, In Private. The Decker Press, 1948. Photographs by Rudy Burckhardt. Estimate $300-500

GOSSAGE, JOHN. Stadt des Schwarz. Berlin: Loosestrife Editions, 1987. One of 500 copies, signed and additionally inscribed. + Together with three other photobooks, including Snake Eyes by Terri Wiefenbach and John Gossage (Loosestrife Editions, 2002); In the Time of the Wall by John Gossage (Loosestrife Editions, 2004); and NY '71 by Daido Moriyama (PPP, 2002). Estimate $600-900

MAN RAY. Photographs by Man Ray, Paris, 1920-1934. James Thrall Soby, (1934). + Together with a copy of Formes nues. Paris: Forme, 1935. Publisher's metal spiral binding with a photographic cover by Man Ray. Estimate $1,500-2,500

STRAND, PAUL. The Mexican Portfolio. Da Capo Press, (1967). Second edition, one of 1000 copies signed by Paul Strand. Estimate $1,500-2,500

You can look at the catalog online or the real items can be viewed at Doyle New York Saturday and Sunday at 175 E. 87th St.