Wednesday, March 9, 2011

Q.R.V. UNWMKD & HIKUPTAH Postcards

Q.R.V. UNWMKD.IMPERF,: A Dozen Dogear Wryde Postcards and Q.R.V. HIKUPTAH: A Dozen Dogear Wryde Postcards by Edward Gorey were published in tandem in 1996. Although the two sets were sold together as a single item, they are often broken up and sold individually today.
Issued in printed envelopes, each postcard set was limited to 500 copies (signed on the envelope, but not numbered) and 26 lettered copies. The lettered copies were hand stamped in the lower left hand corner by Mr. Gorey using an old fashioned alphabet capitol letter stamp. The stamped letters were then hand colored by Mr. Gorey. These stamps remind me of stamp sets I had as a child, and look like something that Mr. Gorey would have found in a yard sale. I am showing one of the signed sets and the lettered set "I".

Each of the 12 cards in the envelopes feature Q.R.V. verses which have been hand lettered by Edward Gorey. The accompanying images however are various "cut and paste" medical, advertising, insect, and miscellaneous images which can be found in numerous books of clip art. Often amusing, the images compliment the verses in unique ways.

2 comments:

Bloglion said...

The lettered versions are so hard to find. I've seen every limited edition of his for sale or up for auction in the last two years except this. Maybe I missed it.

ampootozote said...

Since its original publication, I have not seen the lettered edition of this particular title for sale/auction.

I agree that there has been a lot of Gorey material offered in the past two years, including several large collections coming onto the market. I have found that these things ebb and flow, and it has been a good time to fill gaps in collections.