China North & South. A Series of Vandyck Photogravures illustrating the picturesque aspect of Chinese life and surroundings -
Donald Mennie
Circa 1920 - A. S. Watson &, 16 Nanking Road - First Edition
A clean and superior example of this work by the Scottish born Donald Mennie, published by A. S. Watson in Shanghai.
The first edition, in the publisher’s original card wrappers, without chips or foxing, scarce as such.
Presenting thirty large photogravure plates tipped onto a dark green background each with Mennie’s personal descriptive text. Donald Mennie was born in Scotland in 1875/6 and arrived in China c.1899. His atmospheric, classically composed photographs are in the Pictorialist style, well suited to publication in souvenir photobooks. Mennie became Managing Director of the pharmacy A.S. Watson and Co, in Shanghai, who co-published this work. During the 1920s, he published his photographs in China by Land and Water, The Pageant of Peking, Glimpses of China, China, North and South, Picturesque China and The Grandeur of the Gorges. Mennie’s photographs illustrated My Lady of the Chinese Courtyard by Elizabeth Cooper (1914) and The Great River: The story of a voyage on the Yangtze Kiang by Gretchen Fitkin (1922). Mennie was interned in the Lunghua camp, Shanghai by the Japanese military in March 1943, and died while interned on 10 January 1944.
Provenance: Margaret Seagroatt with her bookplate to the verso of the front wrapper.
Small oblong folio (book size 28.3x22.5cm). In publisher’s stiff light grey-green card wrappers, bound with red silk tie through three holes, upper cover with dark green lettering, vignette, and tipped on photogravure of a Chinese fishing boat. Condition: Fine in near fine wrappers with light edge wear, and soiling. Ref: 112364 Price: HK$ 18,000
The first edition, in the publisher’s original card wrappers, without chips or foxing, scarce as such.
Presenting thirty large photogravure plates tipped onto a dark green background each with Mennie’s personal descriptive text. Donald Mennie was born in Scotland in 1875/6 and arrived in China c.1899. His atmospheric, classically composed photographs are in the Pictorialist style, well suited to publication in souvenir photobooks. Mennie became Managing Director of the pharmacy A.S. Watson and Co, in Shanghai, who co-published this work. During the 1920s, he published his photographs in China by Land and Water, The Pageant of Peking, Glimpses of China, China, North and South, Picturesque China and The Grandeur of the Gorges. Mennie’s photographs illustrated My Lady of the Chinese Courtyard by Elizabeth Cooper (1914) and The Great River: The story of a voyage on the Yangtze Kiang by Gretchen Fitkin (1922). Mennie was interned in the Lunghua camp, Shanghai by the Japanese military in March 1943, and died while interned on 10 January 1944.
Provenance: Margaret Seagroatt with her bookplate to the verso of the front wrapper.
Small oblong folio (book size 28.3x22.5cm). In publisher’s stiff light grey-green card wrappers, bound with red silk tie through three holes, upper cover with dark green lettering, vignette, and tipped on photogravure of a Chinese fishing boat. Condition: Fine in near fine wrappers with light edge wear, and soiling. Ref: 112364 Price: HK$ 18,000