FourCornersBooks_Catalogue_20yrs by Four Corners Books

Four Corners Books is 20 years old this year

Four Corners Books is 20 years old this year.

Founded in 2003 by Richard Embray and Elinor Jansz, we focus on books that encourage thinking about art in areas of life beyond the art gallery. Sometimes this has meant looking at the art of the everyday, like photo wallets, and at other times at artists who frequently worked outside the gallery system, like See Red Women’s Workshop, or Sister Corita Kent. We have produced artists’ books, histories of ephemera, as well as monographs on individual artists worthy of celebration.

Our books are always affordable and accessible, and although we are small, we welcome correspondence with readers and creators at hello@fourcornersbooks.co.uk

Thank you to the many booksellers, distributors, designers, writers, artists, and readers who have helped sustain Four Corners Books over 20 years.

Tam Joseph: I Know What I See

With an introduction by

Eddie Chambers

Bringing together paintings and sculptures from over 40 years, this is the first volume to provide an extensive survey of the work of artist Tam Joseph (b. 1947).

Joseph’s work is wide ranging and moves between different styles and approaches. But while his art takes him in many directions – it is grounded in a sensibility which revels in the connections between things, as well as the creative possibilities of human perception. Some paintings reflect on his own history and the history of injustices faced by African Caribbean people in Britain. Other images draw from diverse sources such as cinema, music and sport, as well as the natural world, and the history of painting itself. Whether his subject is landscape, portrait or history, Joseph employs his deep knowledge of paintings of the past to create work which invites viewers to consider these genres afresh.

Eddie Chambers’ insightful essay explores how Joseph’s independent spirit and boundless imagination offer a thrilling survey of a lifetime’s creative expression.

Tam Joseph lives and works as an artist in London. His work has been exhibited internationally and is represented in many public collections including the Arts Council Collection, Tate and V&A.

Paperback with jacket

268 pages, 20 × 27 cm

ISBN 978-1-909829-23-7

£25

Candy, Andy and the Bearandas

by Alan Dein

With a foreword by

Jamie Anderson

Living in a picture-perfect English village, two panda bears, Mr and Mrs Bearanda, bring up their plastic children, Candy and Andy.

Devised by Gerry Anderson’s Century 21 Productions (Thunderbirds, Captain Scarlet) for the 1960s comic book market, the images created for the photo-strips are a surreal, unique look at domesticity, the family and childhood.

Their unusual nature meant they never reached the popularity of other Anderson characters, and the photo story comics were abandoned after a year.

This book presents the best of the surviving original transparencies from this brilliantly bizarre project: driving their striped mini, preparing for Bonfire Night, or going for a boat ride, Candy, Andy and the Bearandas live in an unforgettable, dreamlike world.

Alan Dein is an oral historian and radio broadcaster. He has been presenting documentary features for BBC Radio 4 since the mid-1990s, and has received several major radio awards including the Prix Italia, the Prix Europa, and the Sony Radio Academy.

Faux-leather hardback, with foil blocking and tipped-in cover image

92 pages, 23 × 16 cm

ISBN 978-1-909829-21-3

£15

Four

The Irregulars is our series of overlooked histories of modern visual culture. They cover a wide range of different subjects, ranging from politics to hobbies. All are linked by the remarkable visual creativity in Britain beyond art galleries and museums.

Some of the work we feature is by artists working outside of the gallery context and some was made by people who didn’t consider themselves artists at all. Each book is an affordable, attractive, and accessible introduction to the subject covered.

There are now 10 volumes, with more in preparation. The series designer is John Morgan.

More Than A Snapshot: A Visual History of Photo Wallets by

Annebella Pollen

Four Corners Irregulars 10

For over 100 years, when you’d often have to wait a week to see your photos, film processors used photo walletscheery illustrated envelopes - to return your pictures to you. They showed what subjects were considered suitable for a snapshot: bright-eyed children, laughing couples, adorable pets and perfect landscapes; they also reinforced prohibitions by what they omitted.

Drawing from the author’s collection of photo wallets from the 1900s to the 1990s, Annebella Pollen’s book charts a century of popular photography in Britain: the birth of a new mass leisure pastime mainly marketed towards women, the growth of camera ownership after the Second World War, and behind it all, the working conditions of the people processing the films. It commemorates a time when you never knew if you had captured a treasured memory or your finger in front of the lens.

Annebella Pollen is Professor of Visual and Material Culture at University of Brighton, UK, where she researches undervalued archives and untold stories in art and design history. Her previous books include Mass Photography: Collective Histories of Everyday Life, The Kindred of the Kibbo Kift: Intellectual Barbarians and Nudism in a Cold Climate: The Visual Culture of Naturists in Mid-20th-Century Britain.

Hardback

112 pages, 22 × 16 cm

ISBN 978-1-909829-22-0

£12

Wheels of Light: Designs for British Light Shows 1970–1990

by Kevin Foakes

Four Corners Irregulars 9

Emerging from avant-garde art performances of the 1960s, light shows became the hip accompaniment to gigs and clubs in the 1970s. Swirling coloured oils and kaleidoscopic patterns were projected across bands and venues, while 360 degree painted ‘panorama wheels’ would slowly rotate in projectors.

From abstract psychedelia to alien planets, the designs for these rotating projections are a snapshot of the creativity and inventiveness of an era.

Kevin Foakes is a graphic designer, DJ and collector who also creates immersive light and sound environments with Pete Williams under the moniker Further.

Hardback

176 pages, 22 × 16 cm

ISBN 978-1-909829-20-6

£14

Women For Peace: Banners From Greenham Common by Charlotte Dew

Four Corners Irregulars 8

In the late summer of 1981, a group of women walked from Cardiff for over a hundred miles carrying a hand-made banner protesting against nuclear missiles. This march to the military base at Greenham Common led to the establishment of camps that, for nearly two decades, drew women from all over the world to make their voices heard in the name of peace.

Women for Peace is a richly illustrated book about the brilliant banners made for the Greenham Common protests. It is a celebration of the collective power of women, women’s art and the history of peace campaigning.

Charlotte Dew is a curator, researcher and writer, specialising in 20th century and contemporary craft. She is currently Public Programme Manager at The Goldsmiths’ Centre in London.

Hardback

224 pages, 22 × 16 cm

ISBN 978-1-909829-18-3

£14

Nuclear War In The UK by Taras Young

Four Corners Irregulars 7

For almost five decades, the United Kingdom made plans for a nuclear attack that never came.* To help prepare, those in power designed and published a variety of booklets, posters and how-to guides. Most infamous among these was the Protect and Survive campaign, but just as fascinating are materials made for the United Kingdom Warning and Monitoring Organisation and the Royal Observer Corps, many of which are reproduced for the first time. Nuclear War in the UK is an eye-opening look at the way Britain’s authorities reacted to the Soviet nuclear threat.

* Correct at time of publication

Taras Young is an author and researcher with a focus on the Cold War. His second book was Apocalypse Ready.

Hardback

128 pages, 22 × 16 cm

ISBN 978-1-909829-16-9

£10

Wobbly Sounds: A Collection of British Flexi Discs by

Jonny Trunk

Four Corners Irregulars 6

Cheap, disposable, often with poor audio quality but with great visuals, flexi discs were vinyl’s poorer cousin in the pre-digital age. Given away with magazines or sent out by advertisers, they extolled the virtues of washing powders, beers, and banks. This book brings together over 150 images of the most remarkable British flexi discs from the 1950s to the 1990s, chronicling the varied and sometimes bizarre uses of these flimsy records.

Jonny Trunk is a writer, broadcaster, DJ and founder of Trunk Records. His other books include The Art of Smallfilms and The Music Library.

Hardback

160 pages, 22 × 16 cm

ISBN 978-1-909829-14-5

£10

Face In The Crowd

by Alan Dein

Four Corners Irregulars 5

From the 1950s onwards, football match programmes regularly featured Face In The Crowd competitions – crowd photographs with a lucky face circled. This promotion, encouraging regular purchasing of match day programmes, also created a visual record of supporters over the decades. They might seem to come from an apparently less complicated era, but these images conjure darker, more disturbing echoes: those of faces caught in the cross hairs, or tracked by the lens of surveillance cameras. A harbinger of a time when we can no longer be just an anonymous face in the crowd.

Alan Dein is an oral historian and a multi-award-winning radio documentary presenter.

Hardback

96 pages, 22 × 16 cm

ISBN 978-1-909829-13-8

£8

by Christine Hankinson & Craig Oldham

Four Corners Irregulars 4

For the past four decades, independent postcard press Leeds Postcards has been making oppositional, inspiring images; activism by design. The cards are not of Leeds; the name represents a defiant rejection of the hegemony of London. They cover a fascinating range of domestic and international politics, causes and campaigns, creating a record of the struggles as well as the progressive political triumphs from 1979 to the present.

Leeds Postcards continues to this day, thanks to a great deal of love, luck and effort, making each card a pocketsized call to arms, punching way above its weight.

Christine Hankinson is publisher and designer of postcard press Leeds Postcards. Craig Oldham is a designer, writer and publisher.

Hardback

152 pages, 22 × 16 cm

ISBN 978-1909829-11-4

£12

Poster Workshop 1968–1971

by Sam Lord, with Peter Dukes, Jo Robinson and Sarah Wilson

With a foreword by

Jess Baines

Four Corners Irregulars 3

From 1968 to 1971, anyone could drop in to the basement in Camden Town and commission a poster from the Poster Workshop. In walked workers on strike, tenants associations, civil rights groups and liberation movements from all over the world. Posters were made on a great number of themes: Vietnam, Northern Ireland, South Africa, housing, workers rights, and revolution.

This book, by Poster Workshop’s members, reproduces all of their posters. Together they give a unique perspective on the key political issues in 1960s and 1970s Britain - many of which still resonate today.

Hardback

128 pages, 22 × 16 cm

ISBN 978-1909829-10-7

£10

Drawings From The National Archives by

David Clarke

Four Corners Irregulars 2

Originally set up after a request from Winston Churchill, the Ministry of Defence’s UFO Desk ran for over 60 years, collating mysterious sightings and records of strange objects in the sky from observant members of the public. As well as letters and official reports, the UFO files contain photographs, drawings and even paintings of these curious sightings.

David Clarke tells the remarkable stories behind these images, including an alien craft on the A1 motorway, flying saucers over Hampstead, and a spaceship landing at a primary school in Macclesfield.

Dr David Clarke is Reader and Principal Lecturer in Journalism at Sheffield Hallam University.

Hardback

128 pages, 22 × 16 cm

ISBN 978-1-909829-09-1

£12

Eyeball Cards

by William Hogan and David Titlow

Four Corners Irregulars 1

This book is the first to document the visual delights of the late 70s and early 80s British CB radio subculture and presents hundreds of the funniest, strangest and most intriguing Eyeball cards from across the UK. Photographer David Titlow has taken portraits of some of the breakers who owned the cards, and writerWilliam Hogan has written a lively history of how and why these cards came to exist. The result is a window into an outpouring of creativity that prefigures online identities — social media handles before there was even an internet.

Will Hogan is an author, screenwriter and journalist and David Titlow is a photographer working in fashion, portraiture and advertising.

Hardback

192 pages, 22 × 16 cm

ISBN 978-1-909829-08-4

£12

Four Corners Familiars

Artists’ responses to classic novels and short stories

The Familiars provide a fresh look at the tradition of the illustrated novel, with each artist choosing a text to be reprinted in full as part of a newly created work. Each book is different in style and format, according to the needs of the artwork and the text. There are 14 books in the series so far. The Familiars series was nominated for the Brit Insurance Design Awards 2011. The series designer is John Morgan.

Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson

Art by Shiraz Bayjoo

Four Corners Familiars 14

Shiraz Bayjoo has created a thrilling visual interpretation of Treasure Island that sets Stevenson’s story within the context of 18th century Atlantic trade and colonial power. The result is timely, urgent and strikingly beautiful.—Ekow Eshun

Shiraz Bayjoo has created a new artist’s book in response to Treasure Island. Presented alongside Stevenson’s text, Bayjoo’s images take us from the ports of England to landscapes scarred by plantations and mines. From the brutality of the 18th Century colonial Caribbean, to the Indian Ocean, and to wider global histories of slavery, colonialism and violence which shaped that period.

Mauritian artist, Shiraz Bayjoo, works with film, painting, photography, performance, and installation. His research-based practice focuses on personal and public archives addressing cultural memory and postcolonial nationhood in a manner that challenges dominant cultural narratives.

Clothbound hardback

280 pages, with single-leaf insert, 23.5 × 16.3 cm

ISBN 978-0-909829-19-0

£20

The Picture of Dorian Gray

Words by Oscar Wilde, art by Gareth Jones

Paperback

128 pages, 34 × 28.5 cm

ISBN 978-0-9545025-4-6

£11.99

2 Dracula by Bram Stoker, illustrated by James Pyman

Clothbound hardback

496 pages, 24 × 14.8 cm

ISBN 978-0-9545025-7-7

£20

Blumfeld, an Elderly Bachelor by Franz Kafka, art by David Musgrave

Hardback

84 pages, 20.5 × 14.5 cm

ISBN 978-0-9545025-6-0

£9.95

Nau Sea Sea Sick by Kay Rosen. With short stories by John Moore, Katherine Mansfield, Isabella Bird, John Aaron Rosen, Eileen Myles

Hardback, with French fold pages

128 pages, 22.5 × 16 cm

ISBN 978-0-9545025-9-1

£11.95

5 A Stick of Green Candy

Stories by Jane Bowles and Denton Welch, art by Colter Jacobsen

Hardback

152 pages, 23 × 15 cm

ISBN 978-0-9561928-0-6

£11.95

6 Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray, art by Donald Urquhart

Hardback

848 pages, 23 × 17 cm

ISBN 978-0-9561928-4-4

£16.99

The Prisoner of Zenda by Anthony Hope, art by Mireille Fauchon

Hardback

272 pages, 9 × 15 cm

ISBN 978-0-9561928-5-1

£9.99

8 Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert, art by Marc-Camille Chaimowicz

Paperback

536 pages, 21 x 27 cm

ISBN 978-0-9561928-9-9

£20

Some Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer, illustrated by Marvin Gaye Chetwynd

Paperback

280 pages, A4 size

ISBN 978-1-909829-00-8

£12.99

The Overcoat by Nikolai Gogol, art by Sarah Dobai

Hardback

88 pages, 29 × 21.5 cm

ISBN 978-1-909829-03-9

£15.99

The Nose by Nikolai Gogol, art by Rick Buckley

Clothbound hardback

96 pages, 19.5 × 13.5 cm

ISBN 978-1-909829-04-6

£10.99

Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad. A work by Fiona Banner, with photographs by Paolo Pellegrin

Paperback, magazine format

312 pages, 24.5 × 32.5cm

ISBN 978-1-909829-05-3

Currently unavailable

Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Sea by Jules Verne, music by Jonny Trunk

Book, blue coloured vinyl LP and MP3 download

120 pages, 30.5 × 30.5 cm

ISBN 978-1-909829-06-0

£20

Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson, art by Shiraz Bayjoo

Clothbound hardback

280 pages, 23.5 × 16.3 cm

ISBN 978-0-909829-19-0

£20

See Red Women’s Workshop Feminist Posters 1974–1990

Foreword by Sheila Rowbotham

Founded in 1974, See Red Women’s Workshop grew out of a shared desire to combat sexist images of women and to create positive and challenging alternatives. Women from different backgrounds came together to make posters and calendars that tackled issues of sexuality, identity and oppression. With humour and bold graphics, they expressed the personal experiences of women as well as their role in wider struggles for change.

Written by See Red members, detailing the group’s history, the book features all of their original screenprints, alongside posters commissioned for radical groups and campaigns. Confronting negative stereotypes, questioning the role of women in society, and promoting women’s selfdetermination, the power and energy of these images reflect an important and dynamic era of women’s liberation — and have continued relevance for today.

Paperback

184 pages, 31 × 22 cm

ISBN 978-1-909-82907-7

£19.99

The Spirited Art Of Sister Corita

by Julie Ault

Admired by Charles and Ray Eames, Buckminster Fuller and Saul Bass, Sister Corita Kent (1918–1986) was one of the most innovative and unusual pop artists of the 1960s, battling the political and religious establishments, revolutionizing graphic design and encouraging the creativity of thousands of people – all while living and practising as a Catholic nun in California.

Mixing advertising slogans and poetry in her prints and commandeering nuns and students to help make ambitious installations, processions and banners, Sister Corita’s work is now recognized as some of the most striking – and joyful –American art of the 60s. But, at the end of the decade and at the height of her fame and prodigious work rate, she left the convent where she had spent her adult life.

Julie Ault’s book is the first to examine Corita’s life and career, containing more than 90 illustrations, many reproduced for the first time, capturing the artist’s use of vibrant and day-glo colours.

Julie Ault is an artist, writer, editor and one of the cofounders of the artists’ collaborative Group Material (1979–1996). Her books also include: Show and Tell: A Chronicle of Group Material and In Part: Writings by Julie Ault

Paperback

128 pages, 28.7 × 24.5 cm

ISBN 0954502522

£15.95

Beauty is in the Street:

A Visual Record of the May ’68 Paris Uprising

Edited by Johan Kugelberg and Philippe Vermès

In May 1968, demonstrations against the French government spread across Parisian universities, and then to factories and other workplaces, resulting in a general strike of 11 million workers that brought the country to a virtual standstill.

Out of the demonstrations rose the Atelier Populaire, a student group who produced hundreds of posters that were used to encourage protestors and report on police brutality. Beauty is in the Street reproduces over 200 of these works, whose dual nature as a means of communication and as a sort of ephemeral artwork have become landmarks in political art and graphic design.

Also included are a wealth of photographs, many published for the first time, and translations of first-hand accounts of the clashes between the students and strikers and the police.

Johan Kugelberg is a writer/editor who runs the Boo-Hooray exhibition space in New York City. His books include The Velvet Underground – New York Art, and Born in the Bronx. Philippe Vermès is an artist, and one of the founders of the Atelier Populaire.

Hardback

272 pages, 28 × 23 cm

ISBN 978-0-9561928-3-7

£25

About The Relative Size of Things In The Universe by Martin Beck, with essays by Emily Pethick, Martin Beck, and Bill Horrigan

Paperback

64 pages, 23 × 18 cm

Co-published with Casco, Office for Art, Design and Theory

ISBN 978-0-9545025-5-3

£9.95

An Architecture of Play by Nils Norman, with essays by Paul Claydon and Keith Cranwell

Paperback

64 pages, 24 × 16 cm

ISBN 0954502507 Out of print

The Art of Smallfilms: The Work of Oliver Postgate and Peter Firmin

Edited by Jonny Trunk and Richard Embray

Introduction by Stewart Lee Hardback

304 pages, 26 × 28 cm

ISBN 978–1–909829–02–2

£25

Brian Wilson: An Art Book

edited by Alex Farquharson Paperback

168 pages, 20 × 13 cm

ISBN 0954502515

£11.95

Disturbances by Critical Art Ensemble, introduction by Brian Holmes Paperback

272 pages, 20 x 27 cm

ISBN 978-0-9561928-8-2

£22.50

Flag Waves: House Flags from the National Maritime Museum by Sue Prichard

Clothbound softback

152 pages, 25 × 23 cm

ISBN 978-1-909829-17-6

£20

Free Speech Zone by Michael Patterson-Carver with contributions by Harrell Fletcher & Matthew Higgs

Hardback

96 pages, 22 × 22 cm

ISBN 978-0-9561928-2-0

£9.99

The Graphic World of Paul Peter Piech by Zoé Whitley

Published in association with V&A Publishing Hardback

192 pages, 31 × 22 cm

ISBN 978-1-909829-01-5 Out of print

Greetings From The Barricades: Revolutionary Postcards in Imperial Russia by Tobie Mathew Hardback

480 pages, 24 × 17cm

ISBN 978-1-909829-12-1

£20

How to Ride the Bus by Jennifer Bornstein

Paperback

48 pages, 17.5 × 10.5 cm

ISBN 978-0-9545025-3-9

£6.95

The Jet Age Compendium: Paolozzi at Ambit Artwork by Eduardo Paolozzi, with an essay by David Brittain

Paperback with day-glo plastic cover

80 pages, plus 28 page essay, 24 × 17 cm

ISBN 978-0-9545025-8-4

£12.95

Pirate Nightmare Vice Explosion by Michael Kupperman

Paperback

148 pages, 31.5 × 24 cm

ISBN 978-0-9561928-7-5

£15.99

Posters from Paddington Printshop by John Phillips

Foreword by Andrzej Klimowski

Paperback

144 pages, 32 × 21.6 cm

ISBN 978-1-909829-15-2

£15

Prison Landscapes by Alyse Emdur

Paperback

176 pages plus fold-out sections, 16.5 × 23.5 cm

ISBN 978-0-9561928-6-8

£15

Show And Tell:

A Chronicle of Group Material

Edited by Julie Ault, with essays by Doug Ashford, Julie Ault, Sabrina Locks, and Tim Rollins

Flexibound paperback

272 pages, 21.6 × 27.95 cm

ISBN 978-0-9561928-1-3

£22.50

Publishers

Richard Embray

Elinor Jansz

Trustees

Alessio Antoniolli

Ines Basille

Mireille Fauchon

Elinor Jansz

Francesca Vinter

With thanks to our former trustees, Andrew Dickson, Lindsay Evans and Emily Pethick

Catalogue designed by John Morgan studio

Photography by Eva Herzog and Michael Harvey (pages 39 and 40)

Printed by Gomer

UK distribution Art Data artdata.co.uk orders@artdata.co.uk

+44 (0)20 8747 1061

International distribution Idea Books ideabooks.nl +31 20 6226154

North America (selected titles) Distributed Art Publishers artbook.com

Online at: fourcornersbooks.co.uk

Email: hello@fourcornersbooks.co.uk Twitter: 4cornersbooks Instagram: fourcornersbooks

Four Corners Books, registered charity 1125471. Registered company 06591195. Company limited by guarantee, registered in England. Registered Office: First Floor, Black Country House, Rounds Green Road, Oldbury, West Midlands, B69 2DG