Our Imported Playing Cards.

First edition of this salesman's sample catalogue for the Paris firm active in the post-war revival of historical, artistic, and regional playing-card designs. The samples include miniature German decks, cards after 17th- and 18th-century costume types, medieval costumes, Swiss folk dress, Le Florentin luxury cards after Renaissance-style paintings by Paul-Émile Bécat, Jean Picart Le Doux's tapestry designs for International Playing Card Week in 1957, Aubusson and Gobelins-style tapestry cards, Carlos Sáenz de Tejada's Romance Español, and designs by Andrés Martinez de Leon. The cover design is by Paul Mathison, a Malibu artist and designer connected with Kenneth Anger and Curtis Harrington's experimental film circle. Oblong octavo (165 x 230 mm), 16 leaves. With 51 colour-printed playing-card samples. Original black quarter cloth, brass screw posts, gilt boards, pictorial paper cover to front board, black endpapers and pages. Binding a little rubbed and marked, internally fresh. A very good copy indeed.