The Dada Painters and Poets: An Anthology

Artists: Jean Arp, Andre Breton, Marcel Duchamp, Max Ernst, Paul Klee, Francis Picabia, Kurt Schwitters, Sophie Taeuber-Arp, Gabrielle Buffet-Picabia et al.
Author: Robert Motherwell (ed.)
Publisher: Wittenborn, Schultz Inc. 
Date: 1951 
Condition: The first edition hardback, with the original unclipped printed dust wrapper over light blue boards with black and white printed design by Paul Rand. The wrapper is very fragile, with tears and weakness along the folds, but apart from one loss at the top spine corner of the front page, is complete, with fading to the spine and tanning to the edges.  The boards are a little tanned and faded at the edges and also to the spine, but otherwise in good condition. Internally a very clean and tidy copy, tight and complete. 

A relatively scarce example of the first publication of this important and historical text, first printed in 1951. Edited by Robert Motherwell, this influential book offered a selection of texts and illustrations which brought together the DADA ideas and manifestoes from a range of important early figures. Texts by Arp, Tzara, Breton, Schwitters and others are complemented by almost 150 illustrations of works, paintings, photographs and graphics of the period.

An important source for documents central to the DADA milieu of the 1920s and 1930s as well as a reminder of how influential European DADA and surrealist ideas were to the development of the New York school of painters.

The designer of the cover, Paul Rand, was an important figure in American graphic design in the mid-century period, being responsible for a host of corporate logos, such as IBM, UPS and Yale University Press, as well as influential ideas on book design and page layout.