Occult & Esoterica
[BLAKESTON, Oswell] Austin Spare: Black Magician
[BLAKESTON, Oswell] Austin Spare: Black Magician
Foreword by Clive Harper
London: I-H-O Books, 2007. First Edition. Wrappers with opaque glassine jacket. Octavo. 162pp. Limited edition of 125 copies of which only 90 were for sale. The book is numbered on a limitation page (No. 17) and also comes with a loose bookplate showing a "Vibratory Portait" by Spare with the same limitation number below the image. Color and b&w photos and illustrations. A fine, unread copy in like jacket. Now quite scarce.
Oswell Blakeston, born Henry Joseph Hasslacher (1907-1985), was an art critic, writer and experimental film maker who was a friend of Dylan Thomas. His tastes were summed up by his partner, Max Chapman, as “a quick eye for the bizarre and the outrageous.” Blakeston first met Spare in the 1930s and for a time was a great admirer of his art. This book collects all of Blakeston’s writings about Spare, and includes images of some unusual Spare paintings.