RUNYAO The Art of Rosaleen Norton [ with Poems by Gavin Greenlees ]

Hardcover, Quarto 128pp. Fine red cloth titled in gilt on spine and with design by Norton on the upper board. Endpapers with printed design by Norton. Printed on heavy weight acid-free art paper, sewn. Frontispiece and 31 full page black & white plates, plus several smaller drawings. Edition Limited to 650 copies. The first US edition of this magnificent book of occult-inspired artist Rosaleen Norton's drawings, with poems by Norton and her lover Gavin Greenlees. The original edition was published in Sydney, Australia, in 1952 and immediately sparked a furor on account of its occult and erotic imagery, and its iconoclastic jabs at the status quo and the authorities who defended it. The 1952 edition was soon banned from importation into the USA on the grounds of obscenity and also had a restricted circulation in Australia, with a court ruling that some of the plates had to be 'blacked out' before copies could legally be sold. It was reprinted in Sydney in 1982, but with a number of changes and omissions. This Teitan Press edition is the first US publication of the book, and the first reprint to include a complete facsimile of the original 1952 edition. The facsimile is prefaced by a new 40 page historical Introduction by Keith Richmond who has previously edited several books of Norton's writings, and wrote the text of the "Occult Visions of Rosaleen Norton" exhibition catalogue.