Signed Portfolio Of Woodblock Prints by J. J.Lankes

This portfolio of woodblock prints by J. J. Lankes contains 25 prints in excellent condition from woodblocks carved by Lankes. Each print is either signed or initialed in the image and some are dated. The paper is an acid-free wove. Each print was made on a separate sheet with a clean verso. The portfolio is bound in a book entitled Virginia Woodcuts and printed in 1930. The book measures 13 x 10 1/4 inches and was released from the Jones Memorial Library, Lynchburg, VA. The cover is slightly worn. The print that is attached to the cover has been sealed with varnish, however another pristine image exists on a separate page in the portfolio. A detailed listing of the prints is included below.

About J. J. Lankes (1884-1960)

A native of Buffalo, New York, Julius John Lankes (1884-1960) achieved national recognition for his mastery of woodcut printing. His works, numbering about thirteen hundred, helped elevate woodblock prints beyond illustrations in commercial productions to recognition as a fine art. Lankes graduated from the Buffalo Commercial and Electro-Mechanical Institute in 1902 and worked as a draftsman specializing in patent drawings before continuing his art studies at the Art Students’ League of Buffalo and the Boston Museum of Fine Arts School. Unsuccessful in painting, Lankes turned his attention to woodblock printing and recorded his first woodcut in 1917. His skill was recognized early. Bolton Brown, a respected lithographer, published a pamphlet on Lankes’s work in 1921 and the following year Wilbur Macey Stone’s book on Lankes’s bookplate designs was published by Frank J. Lankes, the artist’s brother. In 1923 Lankes and poet Robert Frost began a friendship and artistic collaboration that lasted more than forty years. Lankes produced woodcuts to illustrate not only Frost’s poems but also works by Roark Bradford, R. P. T. Coffin, August Derleth, and Ellen Glasgow. In 1925, after a brief visit to Europe, Lankes and his family moved to Hilton Village, near Newport News, Virginia. He accepted a lectureship at Wells College in Aurora, New York, in 1932. For the next seven years, Lankes taught at Wells College and visited his family in Virginia only during the summers. Lankes joined the reproduction section of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics in 1943, where he remained until 1950. In 1951 Lankes moved to Durham, North Carolina. He suffered a debilitating stroke in 1959 and died on 22 April 1960 in Durham. J. J. Lankes was buried in Buffalo on 25 April 1960.

The portfolio will be shipped upon receipt of payment via money order or cashiers check for the total amount, which will include bid price and postage. The cost of USA ground shipping is $5 per volume. International shipping costs to be determined depending on destination.