Arcana:

(BACHARDY, DON). Wescott, Glenway & Billy Al Bengston. New York: The New York Cultural Center, 1974. First Edition. 4to. Illustrated Wrappers. Artist Monograph. Fine.. np (28pp), 22 b&w illustrations + b&w rear cover. With an exhibition checklist, exhibition history and biography. This is the slender twenty-eight page catalogue published in conjunction with a 1974 exhibition of sixty pencil and ink wash portraits executed between 1964 and 1973 by noted Santa Monica artist Don Bachardy held at The New York Cultural Center. The sitters reproduced are Bachardy's longtime partner Christopher Isherwood, Edward Albert, John Ashbery, Pat Ast, W.H. Auden, Truman Capote, Bette Davis, Charles Eastman, John Houseman, John Houston, Anita Loos, Myrna Loy, Anais Nin, Merle Oberon, Igor and Vera Stravinsky, Virgil Thompson, L. Arnold Weissberger, Monroe Wheeler, and artists Chris Burden, Alexis Smith, and Carole Caroompas. A self portrait sketch of Bachardy adorns the rear cover. A bright white, most handsome example of this uncommon item that is the second monographic publication on Bachardy. Laid in is a hand-written note in black ink stating " Dear Charles --- / I'm sending you / this catalogue in case you didn't / get to N.Y. as you expected. / My drawing of you is one / of my favorites of the show. / With best regards, / Don". Charles is the artist's friend Charles Kemper Eastman, the noted late Hollywood screenwriter, script doctor,and director who has placed it along with the invitation to the exhibition's opening next to his portrait reproduced on page twenty-one. These are housed in Bachardy's original hand addressed mailing envelope. Inventory Number: 026563