Praha Panoramaticka by Josef Sudek, Signed First Edition

Praha Panoramaticka (Prague in Panoramic Photographs) by Josef Sudek

First Edition, First Printing, 1959

Signed by Josef Sudek

This is a very scarce signed first edition, first printing of Josef Sudek’s critically acclaimed photobook, “Praha Panoramaticka (Prague In Panoramic Photographs )” published by Statni Nakladatelstvi, Prague in 1959. Containing 284 striking black-and-white panoramic photogravures of Prague and the surrounding countryside, Sudek masterfully captures the city that he loved and shows why he earned the nickname, “The Poet of Prague”.   In The Photobook: A History, Martin Parr and Gerry Badger provide an excellent critique, “Sudek is a photographer whose body of work suggests that photography was as necessary to him as breathing, Josef Sudek claimed the city of Prague and his surroundings as comprehensively as Eugène Atget claimed Paris His masterpiece is one of the most singular photobooks ever made, Praha panoramaticka (Prague Panorama). To create this wealth of memorable images, Sudek used an antique 1894 Kodak Panorama camera with a spring-drive lens that produced a negative of approximately 4 by 12 inches. Of all his books, this one sums up his love of Prague. The panoramic camera is a strong unifying element in the imagery, but so is Sudek's democratic eye, which disregards nothing. His feeling for light, weather, and space in combination has never been surpassed. Praha pnoramatické is a veritable encyclopedia of how to plot, construct and unify a panoramic photograph. And if this were not enough, Sudek even pulls off a near impossible trick at the end of the book: good vertical panoramas".

Measuring approximately 8.5” x 13.5”, the book is bound in cream linen cloth boards in the original photographically illustrated dust jacket.  The condition of the book is FINE- with a small amount of soiling to the covers and a very minor bump to the top center edge. The dust jacket is in Near Fine- condition with some minor chips to the head and heal of the spine and the area where the jacket folds over the book. The dust jacket is unrestored. It is difficult to find copies of this book with the dust jacket intact; because of its unusual format it often was not placed on a shelf in the normal fashion, and therefore most copies were kept in less optimal ways that often led to condition flaws. Notwithstanding the few condition issues to the dust jacket, this would be considered an exceptional copy. I have included several photographs below to provide you with more insight into the dust jacket condition.

The book has been boldly signed and dated by Josef Sudek on the title page. Overall, this is a highly collectible copy of an extremely scarce signed copy of one of the greatest photobooks ever published.

Cited in both “The Photobook: A History”, by Parr and Badger, and “The Open Book” by Andrew Roth.

Photographs of the dust jacket, the book cover, signature, and faults with the dust jacket appear below. Please note that although the photographs appear digitized as thumbnails, they are viewable in the photo viewer by clicking your mouse on the thumbnail.