Prince of the Eye

Philip Hofer-Conquistador of Book Collecting

Conquistador of Book Collecting

Philip Hofer built a monument to the art of the book as no other could have conceived.

Hofer (b.1898) graduated from Harvard and spent a few years in business. He began collecting a wide variety of printed books in 1917.

By 1927 Hofer had determined to build up a personal comprehensive collection which would illustrate the arts of the book from the earliest times to the present. By 1933 he focused on illustrated and decorated books, entering into a serious study of book arts. The scope of his personal collection was described in detail in 1960 in a two-part series in The Book Collector.¹

Hofer worked at the Spencer Collection at New York Public Library, then the Morgan Library, He joined Harvard University Libraries in 1938 as director of Printing and Graphic Arts from 1938- 1978 at Houghton Library and secretary of the Fogg Art Museum.

On his death in 1984 The Book Collector characterised Philip Hofer as the “Conquistador of Book Collecting.” ²

Prince of the Eye.

Hofer built Harvard's study collections of illuminated and calligraphic manuscripts ³ and of illustrated books as well as reference works on the history of books and n1anuscripts. His mission was to emphasize the cultural significance of the means of recording and spreading knowledge through the art and production of the book. He was so astute in identifying what was important to collect he was called “Prince of the Eye.”⁴

In 1968 on his 70th birthday Harvard published Philip Hofer as author and publisher.⁵

Hofer behest

Upon his death Hofer made a behest of his personal collection to Harvard. It contained over five thousand books and manuscripts that Hofer held back in his private collection. These included the finest-quality printed books, the classics of illustration, the most deluxe bindings, the best association copies, one of a kind glorious manuscript pieces, the most fugitive ephemera, as well as objects that had the most personal meanings as milestones in his career.

One hundred items from the bequest are described in A Catalogue of an Exhibition of the Philip Hofer Bequest. Each book or manuscript is displayed in full-page black-and-white illustrations Every facet of Hofer's interest in collecting is represented.

• a twelfth-century German manuscript of Bede's Commentary on Luke,

• a panegyric to Suleiman the Magnificent, possibly written by Ludovico degli Arrighi in Venice around 1525;

• a drawing book by the French architect Gilles Marie Oppenord done in 1698;

• a 1768 type specimen with engraved portraits from the Enschede firm;

• a copy of William Blake's Visions of the Daughters of Albion printed by Blake in 1793;

• an autographed, illustrated letter by Edward Lear;

• Ashendene Press proof sheets for The Wisdom of Jesus (London, 1932).

In addition, there are bestiaries and books on natural history; illustrations by Diirer, Holbein, Rembrandt, Rubens, Jacques Callot, Francis Barlow, Delacroix, Daumier, Dore, Picasso, and Maillol; bookbindings with pedigrees (including royal bindings); festival books; and emblem books.⁶

Philip Hofer Prize

Each year at Harvard the Philip Hofer Prize is awarded to a student or students whose collections of books or works of art best reflect the traditions of breadth, coherence, and imagination exemplified by Philip Hofer.

Hofer’s publishing career.

Listed below are highlights from Hofer’s publishing career.

• Hofer, Philip. 1932. Portraiture in manuscripts and illustrated books. [New York]: [New York Public Library].

• Hofer, Philip. 1938. The illustration of books. [New York]: [Limited Editions Club].

• Hofer, Philip.1950. Illustrations of the book of Job. New York: United Book Guild.

• Hofer, Philip. 1951. Baroque Book Illustration.Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 1951.

• Hofer, Philip, and John Howard Benson. 1953. The art of handwriting: a loan exhibition of writing books and manuscripts from the collections of Philip Hofer, Harvard University, and John Howard Benson. [Providence]: Rhode Island School of Design, Museum of Art.

• Hofer, Philip. 1958. On collecting Japanese manuscript scrolls. [London]: [Book collector].The Book Collector: 369-380.

• Hofer, Philip, and Eleanor M. Garvey. 1961. ˜The artist and the book 1860-1960 in western Europe and the United States. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA.

• Hofer, Philip. 1962. Edward Lear. New York: Oxford Univ. Press.

• Hofer, Philip, and Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. 1964. Some drawings and lithographs for Goethe's Faust by Eugène Delacroix. Harvard College Library, Department of Printing and Graphic Arts, Cambridge 1964

• Hofer, Philip. 1967. Edward Lear as a landscape draughtsman. Cambridge: Mass., Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.

• Hofer, Philip. 1970. Mishaps of a compulsive collector. [Northampton, Mass.]: Printed at the Rosemary Press for Friends of the Smith College Library.

• Hofer, Philip, and Eleanor M. Garvey. 1972. The artist & the book, 1860-1960: in Western Europe and the United States. New York, N.Y.: Hacker Art Books.

• Hofer, Philip, Amy Turner Montague, and Hans Holbein. 1974. The dance of death = Les simulachres & historiees faces de la Mort. Boston: Printed by the Godine Press for the Cygnet Press.

• Hofer, Philip. 1979. Alexander Benois' Russian alphabet in pictures. Harvard library bulletin, Jan. 1979.

1. Jackson, William A. “Contemporary Collectors: XXIV:Philip Hofer” The Book Collector 9 no. 2 Summer, 1960, p. 151- 164; Jackson, William A. “Contemporary Collectors: XXIV:Philip Hofer.” The Book Collector 9 no. 3. autumn: 1960, pt. II : 292-300.

2. “Philp Hofer and Robert Taylor.” 1985. The Book Collector 34 no. 3 autumn: 281-292; "Philip Hofer, 86, a Book Collector at Harvard." New York Times November 12, 1984, p. B15; "Mr Philip Hofer." The Times (London) November 22, 1984, p. 14.

3. See issues of the Harvard Library Bulletin available online.

Walsh, James B. 1969. “Notes on the Philip Hofer Reference Collection.” The Book Collector 18 no 2 (summer): 159-169.

4. William Bentinck Smith 1984. "Prince of the Eye: Phillip Hofer and the Harvard Library."Harvard Library Bulletin 32: 317-347.

5. Hofer, Philip, Ray Nash, Harold Hugo, and Roderick Stinehour. 1968. Philip Hofer as author and publisher. [Cambridge, Mass.]: Harvard College Library, Department of Printing & Graphic Arts."Five hundred copies of this book have been printed by Harold Hugo at the Meriden Gravure Company and by Roderick Stinehour at the Stinehour Press in celebration of the anniversary on 14 March 1968"--Colophon. Bond, W. H., Eleanor M. Garvey, David P. Becker, Katy Homans, Michael Bixler, and Winifred Bixler. 1978. Philip Hofer as author & publisher, a supplement.

6. Harvard College Library, and Philip Hofer. 1988. A catalogue of an exhibition of the Philip Hofer bequest in the Department of Printing and Graphic Arts. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard College Library.