Book Plates

There's a great show of  book plates and ex libris prints at Davidson Galleries in Seattle's Pioneer Square that just ended (okay, I meant to post this earlier).  The book plates displayed in the gallery are miniature prints made by artists to show book ownership.  "Ex libris" means "from the library of."


We come across book plates in our inventory, though they are usually of the mass produced kind that you can buy in a bookstore or stationery store in a box, with a blank space for your name. Often these commercially made book plates are prints of famous pieces of art.  Sometimes they are reading and/or book themed.  I remember receiving a gift such a box of book plates in sixth grade:  the classic image of the cat on top of a stack of books.

Here are some book plates discovered in our current inventory:

Pegasus leaping over a rainbow - found in Richard Wagner:  A Mystic in the Making.

The artwork is by Braldt Bralds; found in The Communication Ethics Controversy.

It's Hokusai's The Great Wave; found in History of the Islamic Peoples.

Appropriately enough, this book plate was found in Irish Carved Ornament.

Found in The Crucible of Europe:  The Ninth and Tenth Centureis in European History.

Found in a book called Metal Processing from 1941.

This is a signed Margaret Atwood book plate; found in her novel The Blind Assassin.  The artist is Claire Lerner.