Paul Koch, Fritz Arnold and the Fursteneck Press

FURSTENECK (Werkstatt Haus zum) [Paul KOCH & Fritz ARNOLD]: A large collection of printed work, some from the handpress, consisting largely of music printing and diverse jobbing ephemera, together with a few examples of work designed or originated but not printed by the Werkstatt. Frankfurt am Main: 1933-40 (for the most part). 

   Various sizes, from broadsheet to small ex-libris, approx. 100 pieces (including a few duplicates), 61 mounted (including a few pamphlets) on 31 pieces of green card, 30 x 24.5cm, and 39 loose, together with 6 loose pamphlets (five sewn into wrappers), 5 books, cloth or boards (including J.S.Bach, Drei Menuette, printed (and signed) by Paul Koch, the Officina Vindobonensis, Vienna, 1932, for Georg Kallmeyer, Wollfenbuttel-Berlin), and copies of three contemporary periodicals featuring articles by or about Koch, one of which is inscribed by him. The Bach Menuette is lacking its backstrip, two of the other books are a little rubbed, otherwise the collection is in fine condition.

   The collection includes bookplates, handbills, concert programmes, two fine broadside calendars for the years 1936 and 1938, a striking coloured decorative map by Willi Harwerth, and several fine examples of Paul Koch’s music printing, in various formats. Some pieces include signs, decorations or vignettes, some hand-coloured, by Rudolf Koch, Fritz Kredel, Willi Harwerth, Karl Vollmer and others. Most employ types designed by Rudolph Koch or Victor Hammer.

   The core of this collection originated in a visit to Koch in Frankfurt in August 1936 by Vivian Ridler, David Bland and Thea Brown. Ridler and Bland were planning a book on Koch’s work to be published the following year by their (semi-private) Perpetua Press. Unfortunately this project was overtaken by events: first, both men’s need to commence settled careers, Ridler initially as assistant to John Johnson at the University Press, Oxford, Bland as production manager at Faber (both jobs began around April 1937), and then the catastrophe of world war which neither Fritz Arnold nor Paul Koch would survive.

   See Jerry Cinamon, ‘Paul Koch, Master Printer of Music’, and ‘Paul Koch and Fritz Arnold’, The Private Library, 6^th Series, 2:3, Autumn 2009, pp.132-48; 2:4, Winter 2009, pp.170-85. Also Will Carter (another visitor to Koch), ‘It all started in Frankfurt in 1938’, pp.113-15 in ABC-XYZapf, ed. by John Dreyfus & K.Erichson, London, 1989. Sold.