A <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/collectibles/vintage-poster/film" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">movie poster</a> for the <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/james-bond" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">James Bond</a> film Thunderball.<ul><li>Robert E. McGinnis (American, 1926-2025).</li><li>Frank McCarthy (American, 1924-2002).</li><li>United Artists.</li><li>Heavy cardstock poster.</li><li>This work is presented unframed.</li></ul> The US Window Card film poster for the James Bond classic&nbsp;Thunderball. Featuring the 'Look Up! Look Down! Look Out!' Robert McGinnis &amp; Frank McCarthy artwork. Thunderball, the much-loved fourth film in the James Bond series, and often referred to as "The underwater one" sees Sean Connery, as 007 heading to the Bahamas to recover two nuclear warheads stolen by S.P.E.C.T.R.E. Agent Emilio Largo in an international extortion scheme.

James Bond Thunderball Window Card Movie Poster

A <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/collectibles/vintage-poster/film" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">movie poster</a> for the <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/james-bond" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">James Bond</a> film On Her Majesty's Secret Service.<ul><li>Robert E. McGinnis (American, b.1926).</li><li>Frank McCarthy (American, 1924-2002).</li><li>United Artists.</li><li>Linen backed.</li><li>This work is presented framed.</li></ul>

James Bond On Her Majesty's Secret Service Movie Poster

The country-of-origin Advance UK Quad <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/collectibles/vintage-poster/film" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">movie poster</a> for the fourth <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/james-bond" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">James Bond</a> film Thunderball.<ul><li>Frank McCarthy (American).</li><li>Robert McGinnis (American).</li><li>Linen backed.</li><li>This work is presented unframed.</li></ul> Fantastic artwork of Sean Connery by Robert McGinnis &amp; Frank McCarthy.

British James Bond Thunderball Movie Poster

Movie poster for the release of <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/james-bond" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">James Bond</a> Thunderball, starring Sean Connery, 1965.<ul><li>Robert E. McGinnis (American, b. 1926).</li><li>Frank McCarthy (American, 1924–2002).</li><li>United Artists.</li><li>Linen backed and unframed.</li></ul>

James Bond Thunderball Movie Poster

A <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book/first-edition?locale=en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">first edition</a> of <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Robert%20Frank&amp;tab=objects&amp;sortBy=bsp_dotcom_prod_en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Robert Frank</a>'s <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book?Book%20Type=Art%2520and%2520Design" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">photobook</a> The Americans.<ul><li>Robert Frank (American).</li><li>New York: Grove Press, Inc., 1959.</li><li>170 pages.</li><li>First American edition.</li><li>83 black and white photographs printed in gravure.</li><li>Plain endpapers, black cloth-covered boards, titles to spine in gold, white photo-illustrated dust-jacket printed in black, black and red collage by Alfred Leslie on the lower panel.</li></ul> The first American edition of Frank's masterpiece, after Robert Delpire's Les Américains, was published in France the previous year. The Americans follows a careful and complex sequence, with four chapters, each introduced by a photograph of the American flag. In his successful application for the Guggenheim grant that allowed him to make this work Frank wrote: 'The project I have in mind is one that will shape itself as it proceeds... The material is there; the practice will be in the photographer's hand, the vision in his mind!' Between April 1955 and June 1956 he set out on a series of trips across America. His aim was to complete a body of work that would be 'a broad, voluminous picture record of things American, past and present... A visual study of a civilisation.' For this, the defining edition, Frank stripped the texts which appeared opposite the photographs in Delpire's edition and added an introduction by Jack Kerouac, who writes, 'What a poem this is, what poems can be written about this book of pictures some day by young new writers.... Whether 'tis the milk of humankind-ness, or human-kindness, Shakespeare meant, makes no difference when you look at these pictures. Better than a show... Robert Frank, Swiss, unobtrusive, nice, with that little camera that he raises and snaps with one hand he sucked a sad poem right out of America onto film, taking rank among the tragic poets of the world!' Like Vladimir Nabakov, Frank saw 1950s America as no American could have seen it, 'the loneliness, alienation, rootlessness, and sadness of automobile-happy mid-century America.' David Levi Strauss referred to the French edition as sociology, whereas the American edition is poetry. And as Kerouac writes 'Anybody doesn't like these pitchers don't like potry, see?' With this book, Frank galvaniZed photography for his generation and has influenced, in some way, every other generation since.

The Americans | First American Edition

A group of <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book?Book%20Subject=Association%2520items" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">association copies</a> of the work of <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Robert%20Frank&amp;tab=objects&amp;sortBy=bsp_dotcom_prod_en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Robert Frank</a>, including <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book/first-edition?locale=en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">first editions</a> and <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book?locale=en&amp;Book%20Type=Signed%2520and%2520Inscribed" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">signed</a> books.<ul><li>Sold as a set of 4 volumes.</li><li>Robert Frank (Swiss-American).</li><li>Les Américains [with] New York Is; [and] The Americans; [and] London / Wales.</li><li>Paris: New York; New York; Zurich, 1958; [1959]; 1969; 2003.</li></ul> Includes the following: <ul><li>Les Américains. Photographies de Robert Frank.</li><li>Paris: Encyclopédie Essentielle, Robert Delpire Éditeur, 1958.</li><li>First edition.</li><li>Inscribed in black ink on half-title.</li><li>Oblong octavo.</li><li>172 pages.</li><li>Black and white photographs printed in gravure by Draeger Frères, Montrouge.</li><li>Texts by various authors selected by Alain Bosquet.</li><li>Occasional minor spotting.</li><li>Plain thick endpapers, sewn headband, laminated white paper-covered boards illustrated with an illustration by Saul Steinberg printed in light blue, black, and red, lightly toned, light creasing to upper joint.</li><li>Motomura Kazuhiko’s card sleeve titled in black ink on upper side.</li></ul> <ul><li>New York Is.</li><li>Introduction by Gilbert Millstein.</li><li>[New York], [New York Times Company], [1959].</li><li>First edition.</li><li>Signed in black ink on verso of front free endpaper.</li><li>Quarto.</li><li>56 pages.</li><li>Black and white photographs.</li><li>Light toning to edges.</li><li>Black front and red rear endpapers, printed paper-covered boards, white, titles in black, light toning to edges, light wear to head and foot of spine, top corner bumped, without the laid in letter from the advertising director.</li><li>Motomura Kazuhiko’s card sleeve titled in black ink on upper side.</li></ul> <ul><li>The Americans. Photographs by Robert Frank. </li><li>Introduction by Jack Kerouac.</li><li>Afterword by Robert Frank with details of the four films he made 1959- 68.</li><li>New York: An Aperture Book, Grossman Publishers, 1969.</li><li>Oblong octavo.</li><li>182 pages.</li><li>Second edition, revised and enlarged.</li><li>Inscribed in black ink.</li><li>Black and white photographs printed in ‘stonetone’ offset by Rapoport Printing Corp., New York.</li><li>Occasional light spotting, light marking to edges, printer’s ink mark to one page.</li><li>Plain endpapers, light spotting, black cloth-covered boards, titles to spine in gold, photo-illustrated dust-jacket, white, text in black, minor toning, lightly marked.</li><li>Motomura Kazuhiko’s card sleeve titled in black ink on upper side.</li></ul> <ul><li>London / Wales. </li><li>Zurich, Berlin, New York: Scalo, 2003.</li><li>Quarto.</li><li>126 pages.</li><li>First edition.</li><li>Inscribed in black ink on half-title.</li><li>Black and white photographs printed in offset.</li><li>Plain endpapers, black cloth-covered boards, titles to spine in grey, photo- illustrated dust-jacket, white, text in black.</li><li>Minor shelfwear.</li><li>Motomura Kazuhiko’s card sleeve titled in black ink on upper side.</li><li>Photocopy of list exhibited works shown at the Corcoran Gallery, Washington laid in.</li></ul> Motomura Kazuhiko was a civil servant who grew up watching Akira Kurosawa films, which led to his interest in visual art and black-and-white photography. He was an important collector of photographs and photography books and a tireless champion of Japanese photographers, promoting their work and supporting their books and exhibitions. He published four books over a 37-year period: Robert Frank’s The Lines of My Hand (1972), Flower Is (1987), and The Americans: 81 Contact Sheets (2009); Jun Morinaga’s River, its shadow of shadows (1978); and helped organize or distribute others, including Mochizuki Masao’s Television (2001) and Suzuki Kiyoshi’s Tenmaku No Machi [A Town of Tents]: Mind Games (1982). In 1960, Motomura worked as a tax officer. While still employed, he enrolled in the Shashin Sōgō Senmon Gakkō (now Tokyo College of Photography), where he was taught by Ishimoto Yasuhiro and Shigemori Koen. After participating in the demonstrations against the 1960 renewal of the US Japanese security treaty, Motomura resigned from his position, fearing that his employers might penalize him. While studying photography, Motomura was introduced to Robert Frank’s work when he saw the portfolio of thirty-eight photographs in US Camera Annual 1958 (of which twenty-three would appear in The Americans). Ishimoto Yasuhiro recommended that he buy Les Américains instead of The Americans because he thought the printing was better. Motomura met and befriended Morinaga Jun at the Tokyo College of Photography. Morinaga assisted W. Eugene Smith on a commission for Hitachi that would become Japan: Chapter of Image (1963). Through Morinaga, Motomura met W. Eugene Smith, who introduced him to Robert Frank as a favor in return for Motomura helping Smith to organise a retrospective exhibition in Tokyo. In October 1970, Motomura and his classmate Hataya Norio travelled to New York to meet Robert Frank. During this trip, Motomura also visited W. Eugene Smith and his fiancé Aileen, and they discussed the idea of travelling to Minamata in Southern Japan to photograph the devastating effects of mercury poisoning on the local populace. In 1971, Smith and Aileen moved to Minamata, where they spent three years photographing and researching the devastating effects of mercury poisoning on the local populace. While working on the Minamata project, Smith’s initial living costs in Japan were covered by Motomura Kazuhiko. When Motomura first met with Frank, Aileen acted as an interpreter. Frank recounts this first meeting in the preface to The Lines of My Hand, in which he writes of how he was visited by two Japanese editors and inspired by their respect for his art and their eagerness to publish his book in Japan, a project he describes as reviving his interest in photography at a time when he had abandoned it for filmmaking: ‘Well, one evening early late or middle last November, two Japanese gentlemen rang my bell on the Bowery. Mr. Kazuhiko Motomura and Mr. Toshio [Norio] Hataya did not speak any English or where [sic] too shy to try. They brought a girl who translated... I remember the evening very well. They said that they had always liked my photographs. They came to New York to ask my permission to have a book published of my work. Something like that had never happened to me. I was impressed and happy. They also gave me a small excellent taperecorder [sic] on which part of our conversation was recorded. Then they apologized that they hadn’t given me a brand new one. When the two gentlemen left I said to June, I’m really going to work on that and try to make it good. It was the right time for me, I was just finishing my last film “About me... A Musical”. I had gone to Nova Scotia in the summer and bought a place in order to get away from it all and to see the clear ocean and to be more alone. So once more, I go back to look at all these exposed memories, all these buildings, skies and people – lost and saved up...’

Les Américains [with] New York Is [and] The Americans [and] London / Wales First Editions

This first edition copy of Flower Is contains three bodies of work: photographs taken in Paris of flowers, flower sellers and chance encounters on the street, the River Rouge car factory in Detroit, and Polaroids made in Mabou Mines, Nova Scotia.&nbsp;<ul><li>Robert Frank (Swiss-American).</li><li>Design by Sugiura Kohei and Sato Atsushi.</li><li>Tokyo: Yugensha / Kazuhiko Motomura, 1987.</li><li>112 pages.</li><li>Folio.</li><li>Includes black-and-white photographs printed in offset.</li><li>Bound in grey silk-covered boards, titles stamped in dark grey on spine and upper side, publisher's grey paper-covered board slipcase with titles stamped in dark grey on spine.</li><li>Accompanied by original shipping carton.</li></ul> Flower Is is the second of three books Frank made with Motomura Kazuhiko, a collector of photographs and photography books and occasional publisher, each designed by Sugiura Kohei. "By 1949 I had lived in New York City for two years. When I returned to Paris, I was 26. The beauty of that city touched me... Returning to America I began to look at Americans... and began to photograph the city and factory which produced the American car. The summer of 1955 was hot and after two days at the River Rouge Plant in Detroit I was told to leave the factory. I travelled south and was astonished to see black people treated as inferiors. I experienced the suspicion against anything not 'American'. I was learning about American determination to win... Flowers of Paris is memory... After the publication of The Americans in 1959, a slow fade begins. Filmmaking replaces the single frame photograph!"

Flower Is

Movie poster for the 1967 release of <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/james-bond" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">James Bond</a>'s You Only Live Twice, starring Sean Connery.<ul><li>Frank McCarthy (American, 1924–2002).</li><li>Robert E. McGinnis (American, b. 1926).</li><li>United Artists.</li><li>Style C poster used for drive-ins and special displays, printed on heavier paper stock.</li><li>Linen backed and unframed.</li></ul>

James Bond You Only Live Twice Movie Poster

Books, Manuscripts & Objects from Three Important Collections

T.S. Eliot—W.H. Auden and others A series of 11 letters signed by writers (chiefly autograph), discussing the character of T.S. Eliot, to Michael Gonin, 12 pages, various sizes, 1965–72 (but chiefly 1965), by: i) W.H. Auden, providing a careful and sympathetic view of Eliot, noting the difference between his public persona and personal character (“…Everyone seems the serious conscientious Arch-deacon. Few, except the personal friends, are aware of the little boy who loved simple practical jokes…”), and reflecting on his poetry, 2 pages, 4to, Kirchstetten, Austria, 23 April n.y., splitting at folds ii) William Golding (“…He tried to be kind to me, I believe, but he was so tall, so thin, so distinguistly [sic] stooping, and there was so little I could contribute to any conversation with him that my opinion is hardly worth having…”), 27 November n.y. iii) Robert Graves (“…As a poet he burned out about 1926 – the main passion has been suppression homosexual, I understand […] he was also a coward. But I couldn’t dislike him…”), 14 Jun n.y. iv) Graham Greene (“…I always found him a rather aloof character and we came together only on certain esoteric enjoyments – such as the books dealing with the exploits of Arsene Lupin…”), 27 January 1972 v) Frank Kermode, 31 May 1965 vi) John Lehmann, 6 December 1965 vii) Michael Ramsey, Archbishop of Canterbury, 5 July 1965 viii) Herbert Read, (“…Far from being arrogant or in any sense an objectionable personality he was one of the kindest and most considerate people I have ever known…”), 12 July 1965 ix) Bertrand Russell, recalling two meetings with Eliot in 1914 that provide a wholly unsympathetic view of his character, 1 page, 9 March 1965 x) Lord Snow, 9 June 1965 xi) Hugh Trevor-Roper (“…I don’t think that I ever met T.S. Eliot […] I do not like his cold, starched, slightly inhuman high-church formalism and thin-blooded reactionary views!...”), 8 November 1967 “…Eliot was certainly not narrow-minded but, as a poet, the range of experience and emotion with which he could deal was a narrow one. Indeed what to me is most extraordinary about his work is how much he managed to do with so little…” (W.H. Auden) After the death of T.S. Eliot a Canadian, Michael Gonin, wrote to a number of writers with a serious of tendentious questions about Eliot’s supposedly cold, arrogant, and prejudiced personality. These replies provide a fascinating range of responses. Some of the public figures to whom Gonin had written had barely known Eliot, although this did not always stop them from having a strong opinion on his personal qualities, but in general, as might be expected, those who had known him best tended to write with more nuance and sympathy about his personal characteristics. The two most interesting replies came from men who had known Eliot well. W.H. Auden writes with grace and sympathy. He acknowledges the anti-Semitism that mars Eliot’s early work but charitably explains it as the product of his upbringing; he also makes very clear that Eliot’s public persona was only one aspect of his character. His letter also includes revealing comments on Eliot’s poetry. In contrast, Bertrand Russell’s comments on Eliot are extraordinarily poisonous and no doubt stem in part from the longstanding bitterness originating in Russell’s destructive relationship with Eliot’s first wife. Russell claims that Eliot’s only contribution to discussion during three months as Russell’s graduate student at Harvard in 1914 was to compare the pre-Socratic philosopher Heraclitus to the French poet Villon. Russell also reports their conversation in London after the outbreak of war later that same year: “…I said ‘What are you doing here?’ He said, ‘I have just returned from Berlin.’ I said, ‘What do you think of the war?’ He said, ‘I don’t know, except that I’m not a pacifist.’ I said, ‘I see. You don’t care what people are killed about, so long as they kill each other.’…” PROVENANCE Christie's, London, 3 December 1986, lot 363a

View 1 of Lot 99: T.S. Eliot—WH. Auden and others | Series of 11 letters on Eliot's character, to Michael Gonin, 1965-72

t.s. eliot—wh. auden and others | series of 11 letters on eliot's character, to michael gonin, 1965-72

A group of 10 volumes concerning the Automaton Chess Player, comprising:

A group of 10 volumes concerning the Automaton Chess Player, comprising: (i) L. D[utens]. Lettres sur un automate, qui joue aux échecs. 1772. 8vo (179 x 119 mm), title-page with woodcut device, modern buckram boards, pamphlet detached from binding, edges lightly browned and frayed, endleaves replaced, upper board slightly soiled (ii) Johann Philipp Ostertag. Etwas über den Kempelischen Schachspieler; eine Gruppe philosophischer Grillen. Frankfurt and Regensburg, 1783. 8vo (176 x 115 mm), original paper wrappers, leaves uncut, wrappers slightly frayed (iii) Karl Gottlieb von Windisch. Briefe über den Schachspieler des Herrn von Kempelen. Pressburg: Anton Löwe, 1783. 8vo (174 x 100 mm), original blue paper wrappers, leaves uncut, some unopened; top edge and wrappers slightly soiled (iv) C. F. Hindenburg. Ueber den Schachspieler des Herrn von Kempelen, nebst einer Abbildung und Beschreibung seiner Sprachmaschine. Leipzig: in der Johann Gottfried Müllershen Buchhandlung, 1784. FIRST EDITION, 8vo (214 x 113 mm), numerical diagrams in text, folding engraved plate of the speaking machine at end, red half morocco over boards stamped with chess pieces, deckle edges, slight browning and occasional spotting (v) J. J. Ebert. Nachricht von dem berühmten Schachspieler und der Sprachmaschine des K. K. Hofkammerraths Herrn von Kempelen. 1785. 8vo (190 x 118 mm), two folding engraved plates, green half morocco over boards stamped with chess pieces, deckle edges, worming to first two leaves, endleaves renewed (vi) [Philip Thicknesse]. The speaking figure, and the automaton chess-player, exposed and detected. London: John Stockdale, 1784. 8vo (203 x 122 mm), engraved frontispiece, publisher's 4-page advertisement at end, speckled half calf over marbled boards, frontispiece soiled, shaved, and remounted (possibly from another copy), endleaves renewed (vii) An Oxford Graduate [Robert Gray, Jr.?]. Observations on the automaton chess player. London: J. Hatchard, 1819. 8vo (202 x 126 mm), half-title, title, unbound sheets, housed in paper envelope addressed to "A Buschke, Books-Serials-Chess Literature", light soiling to both endleaves, envelope cut open at edges (viii) W.J. Hunneman. Chess. A selection of fifty games from those played by the automaton chess-player during its exhibition in London. London: W. Pople, 1820. 12mo (167 x 100 mm), errata leaf at end, brown cloth boards, a few leaves frayed, some spotted and some lightly ink blotted, not affecting text, soiling to p. iv, 5.5cm closed tear to p. 49 (not affecting text) (ix) Robert Willis. An attempt to analyse the automaton chess player, of Mr. de Kempelen. London: Printed for J. Booth, 1821. FIRST EDITION, 8vo (140 x 134 mm), half-title, 10 lithographed plates (including frontispiece) by Willis printed by C. Hullmandel, plain boards, mild dampstaining in final few leaves, endleaves renewed, boards soiled, joints cracked (x) Observations upon the automaton chess player of von Kempelen. Philadelphia: J. Dobson, 1827. 8vo (221 x 143 mm), four engraved diagrams in-text, publisher's printed wrappers, spotting and light dampstaining throughout, edges frayed A GROUP OF RARE WORKS ON THE CHESS-PLAYING AUTOMATON: THE PURPORTED ENLIGHTENMENT PRECURSOR TO MODERN-DAY ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE. The Hungarian inventor Wolfgang von Kempelen's chess-playing automaton, the "Mechanical Turk", was presented to Empress Maria Theresa in 1769. The machine consisted of a life-sized model of a human head and torso, dressed in Turkish robes and a turban, seated behind a large cabinet on top of which a chessboard was placed. The machine appeared to be able to play a strong game of chess against a human opponent, but was in fact merely an elaborate simulation of mechanical automation: a human chess master concealed inside the cabinet would puppeteer the Turk from below by means of a series of levers. With a skilled operator in control, the Turk was toured and exhibited for 84 years around Europe and the Americas, winning most of the games played during its demonstrations. The Turk played and defeated many challengers, famously including statesmen such as Napoleon Bonaparte and Benjamin Franklin. Napoleon's game against the Turk in 1809 is particularly noteworthy; eyewitnesses claimed that Napoleon's repeated illegal moves were met with the Turk sweeping all the pieces off the board. Although many had suspected the machine was faked, Robert Willis was the first to publish a correct explanation of the hoax, 51 years after its creation. Numerous other works were written on the Turk, both accurately and inaccurately describing the mechanism. The Turk continued, however, to be exhibited, winning most of the games played during its demonstrations until 1854, when it was destroyed in a fire. It was only after the loss of the Turk that the secret was fully revealed to the public, by the final private owner's son, Silas Mitchell. In his article for The Chess Monthly in 1857, Mitchell wrote that "There are no longer any reasons for concealing from the amateurs of chess, the solution of this ancient enigma". For an inscribed copy of the French translation of item (iii), see lot 34. PROVENANCE: (i) Cleveland Public Library: bookplate; (v) Poul Hage, Danish chessplayer (1906-1984): bookplate; (vi) Meindert Niemeijer, Dutch chess-player and collector (1902-1987): bookplate; Koninklijke Bibliotheek, The Hague: sold duplicate stamp; (ix) Brooklyn Public Library: library stamp, shelfmark to lower board LITERATURE: (iii) VDL Geschichte II, p. 338; KB 4018; (iv) VDL Geschichte II, p.339; Schachlitteratur 1121; KB 4024; (vi) ESTC N23931; Toole Stott 417

View 1 of Lot 2: Automaton Chess Player | A group of 10 rare volumes on the purported Enlightenment precursor to modern-day artificial intelligence

Results for "Robert Frank"