2023 Rare Book and Graphic Arts Fair in Paris

It’s September 2023: For once, I receive invitations to the Rare Book and Graphic Arts Fair, after buying a second-hand book that reeks of smoke on a site for book lovers. Tickets cost 10 euros each, but thanks to these invitations, I can go for free with my girlfriend M., which makes up a bit for the smelly book I put in the “books to swap” box outside the metro. My friend M. is curious and interested in everything, so she’s already been to the gem and jewelry show with me, and now to the rare book fair even though she’s not a bibliophile.

I am (a bit) bibliophilic for less than a year, so I’m really excited to discover what’s at the fair.

It’s my first time at this fair, so I don’t really know how to make the most of it or where to look. Naturally, my attention was drawn to the stands near the entrance.

It’s at M. Moleiro Editor The Art of Perfection that I discovered you can still buy books of hours, where the gold details are added by hand. They managed to make a vegetable parchment to reproduce some book or other (of which the Pope owns a copy). Since I’ve recently become interested in books of hours and illumination, I see it as a great opportunity to get a facsimile, but I quickly back off at the announced price (around 10,000 euros). It’s very pretty, but no thanks!

At At Henri Piazza editions,I discover full leather-bound books like I love, brand new… and beautiful second-hand books. I’ve never seen such beautiful books, with gilt edges with patterns, handmade binding, and a handmade slipcase. There’s a very interested bibliophile who asks to see some very beautiful second-hand books, which lets me look by proxy. However, prices aren’t clearly displayed, and I feel a bit lost because I don’t really understand why this publisher sells second-hand books from other publishers… Anyway, there’s an absolutely extraordinary book with stencil illustrations, and the gilt edges are out of this world. 6,000 euros. Compared to the books at the next stand, it’s almost a steal! It’s here that I discover the talent of Lucy Boucher, a miniaturist who creates stencil illustrations; there are so many details and colors that it requires no fewer than 80 passes. I think it will be more economical for me to buy ONE of her illustrations rather than a whole book.

At the Librairie Vignes in Paris, I discover beautiful photos, including a copy of In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower with 2 placards by Marcel Proust…

…and a very beautiful copy of Cyrano de Bergerac. While the bookseller carefully shows us the book, a bibliophile appears out of nowhere and tries to put her greasy fingers on the copy, which horrifies us. But the bookseller handles the incident tactfully; he must be used to it!

My favorite is this artist’s book by Anne-Lise Courchay, an illuminator artist but with a modern style (a bit of pointillism). She draws on parchment and then glues it onto leather (“Each leaf is mounted on a velvet goatskin whose color plays in transparency, modifying the white of the parchment, making it warmer or cooler, darker or brighter, reinforcing the atmospheric mood of each spread”) and does the binding herself. I’ve seen other artist’s books on her Instagram account and I really like her style, even though I think it lacks a bit of gold 😀

Then it’s chaos; I don’t really know what I’m looking at; I don’t see the same rare books I usually see on rare book forums (I have to admit I hang out way too much on English-speaking forums). I’m very happy to come across this copy of “Birds from America,” but on checking, it’s actually The Birds of America by Audubon that I would have liked to find.

Paul Verlaine seems to cost less than Proust, “only” 9,000 euros.

Specialized booksellers in “Jules Verne” are numerous, and they brought their finest copies.

I inquire at a bookbinding school in the 77 department. They have a CAP bookbinding program part-time. This isn’t the first time I’ve heard of such programs for those who still work. I get the impression that because it’s a dying craft, or aimed at career changers, the program is never full-time. However, the person at the stand is very nice and told me I could come to the school to sit in on a class, just to see how it goes. At their stand, there’s a bookbinding teacher trying to do gilding for the demo. She tells me she hasn’t done it in 10 years, that the trades of bookbinder and gilder are completely different. It completely discourages me, as I think it’s silly to waste 2 years of my life and end up not knowing how to do gilding.

I walk around the fair with M., but some stands aren’t very welcoming—for example, you can’t tell if it’s a bookseller, a publisher, or a binder… I left the fair half happy, half confused, feeling like I didn’t make the most of it. Later, I read an article by a journalist about the fair, and it seems we didn’t visit the same place; he mentioned lots of works I didn’t see.

My friend M. seems bored too, so we leave the fair to sit down at the restaurant right next door.

The food was excellent, but a couple sitting next to us had nothing to say to each other, and the lady took the opportunity to talk to us non-stop. She was very well dressed, with her hair perfectly done, and her husband used to work for UNESCO; but even he seemed fed up with his wife, sitting as far away from her as possible and letting her bother us throughout the meal—despite our attempts to keep her out of our conversations. It often happens that people at nearby tables listen attentively to my conversations, staring at me as if I were a TV (especially when I talk about our trip to Easter Island), but this is the first time someone has completely barged in. Oh well, I ate well 😀 and since the lady was available to answer questions, I asked her a whole bunch of questions about her life to find out what a wealthy lady, living in the 7th arrondissement, who organized her daughter’s wedding in some castle or other, does with her days. The answer was so uninteresting that I can’t remember it anymore.

I hope I’ll get the chance to come back to this fair another year, with a bit more preparation this time.