Fritz Henle Books and Portfolios Sale

Fritz Henle 50 Years Very rare. Published by Rollei Fototechnic Gmbh in 1984. Silver portfolio box embossed with Henle's name. Includes a brief essay by Henle, "Life is Photography" in English, French and German. Portfolio contains 24 Rolleiflex photographs, most about 10.5x10.5 printed by rotogravure on 13.5x13.5 heavy stock. Near-fine condition; very clean and crisp with no internal marks. $325   SOLD

 Fritz Henle 1973. Foreward by Allan Porter.  App. 13.5x13.5 inch hardcover in dark blue boards and gilt titles, published without dustjacket. Covers are in very good condition but with some fading.  These are the exact same photographs as the 50 Year portfolio, printed by rotogravure the exact same size on the same heavy stock, but bound into a book instead of loose. Rare.  $99.95

The American Virgin Islands: A Photographic Essay 1971. 13x13-inch clamshell box with 24 color prints (probably by rotogravure) tipped in on heavy stock. Prints are pristine. box looks great, but has one breaking crease at foldover. $55

U.S. Virgin Islands: Jewels of the Caribbean 48-page travel booklet 9x12 inches with great photographs by Henle. Near-fine condition. $29.95

Paris With text by Elliot Paul, design by Alexy Brodovitch. Ziff-Davis, 1971. Near-fine except for some age-yellowing, in taped but mostly intact dust jacket. Henle made these photographs in 1938, but they were rejected by Life Magazine and not published until 1947. Many consider it his greatest work. As far as I can tell, this is a first edition. $35   SOLD

Hawaii Hastings House, New York, 1948. 9-1/2 x 12-1/2 inches, worn and faded blue cloth hardcover, no dust jacket. But the pictures inside are fine! $14.95

Mexico  Ziff-Davis, 1945. First edition as far as I can tell. Very good hardcover binding with some age-yellowing in tattered and taped dust jacket. $19.95  SOLD

 Fritz Henle's Rollei  Hastings House, New York, 1950. First edition in black cloth binding, somewhat worn with spine fading. No dust jacket. 87 full page photos by Henle. $14.95

Fritz Henle's Guide to Rollei Photography  Thames & Hudson, London, 1956. First Edition. Very good hardcover with some spine wear in torn and taped dust jacket. This book must be rarer than I thought, because some of the prices are over the moon. I'm only asking $55.   SOLD

A New Guide to Rollei Photography  The Viking Press, New York, 1965. Good cloth-bound hardcover in torn and taped (but intact) dust jacket. My very favorite Henle book. Again, this book must be rarer than I thought, because some of the prices are over the moon. Since the frontispiece is missing I'm only asking $75.

Holiday in Europe  The Viking Press, New York, 1964. First Edition in very good plus cloth binding in very good plus dust jacket with slight edge wear. Text by Anne Fremantle. This is Henle's last book photographed entirely with twin-lens Rolleis. $9.95

Casals  Amphoto, 1975. First Edition. Near-fine hardcover in very good dust jacket with small mended tear. Henle made these photographs exclusively with the Rollei SL66. $9.95   SOLD

Photography for Everyone  The Viking Press, 1959. Good hardcover in fair dust jacket. First Edition. $9.95

 Virgin Islands   Hastings House, New York, 1949. First Edition. Very good hardcover, no dust jacket. Rare.  $19.95

The Caribbean: A Journey with Pictures  The Viking Press, New York, 1957. Good-plus hard cover with some edge and spine wear and fading in good-plus dust jacket with mended tears.. First Edition. $9.95

Camera Magazine  June, 1969 edition. Article about Henle and photos from his Virgin Islands portfolio. $9.95

Contact Information: Please contact me by e-mail at djphoto@vol.com.

Shipping Information:

All books will be shipped USPS Media Mail unless you want to pay for faster service. However, I will always use the mailing service that costs you least, and in some cases that may be Priority Mail. Prices are for U.S. shipping only.

My PayPal ID is djphoto@vol.com. Regular PayPal only – I do not do Gift.

First book: $4.50.

Additional books: $1.95

Booklets and magazines: $2.95

Additional pamphlets/brochures: 95 cents.

Portfolios and largest books: $6

If the total shipping cost of your order is more than the cost of a Priority Mail Flat Rate envelope or box and if the order will fit in a Flat Rate envelope or box, I will ship it Priority Mail.

A Priority Mail Medium Flat Rate box will hold four to six books. If you order four or more books and they will fit in a medium box, I will ship by Priority Mail.

The above prices are for shipping to the continental United States only. For shipping to other countries, there may be a surcharge of $4 to $7.50 for filling out customs forms. Please be aware that recent price increases by the U.S. Postal Service have made international shipping very expensive. When shipping books with a value of more than $75 overseas, I will only ship by Priority Mail with insurance. International shipments weighing more than four pounds must be shipped by Priority Mail in any case.

Soli Deo Gloria

For the glory of God Alone 

Coming: Fritz Henle Book and Portfolios Sale

Fritz Henle 50 Years Portfolio

Blog note: I'm selling most of my Fritz Henle books and portfolios and had hoped to have them all listed for this post; however I'm not going to make my self-imposed deadline. I will have them all up later today. Sorry!   -- Dave

Footloose in Italy: The Cinque Terra

Corniglia sits on a high promontory

at the base of the mountains.

Louise and I love to travel, both in the U.S. and abroad, and have been blessed with the opportunity to visit more than 30 countries as well as most of our states. Since the late 1980s we seem to have averaged about one major trip every five years. In 2005 our destination was Italy.

I call the way I like to travel "footloose," meaning no fixed itinerary and no fixed schedule. Louise doesn't like doing that as much as I do, and indeed it's getting increasingly difficult to travel that way, especially abroad. But this was 15 years ago, the world wasn't quite as hostile a place, and Louise was only 60 then and more adaptable.

We arrived in Rome and found a nice place to stay. I'll write more about our time in Rome in a future post. We spent several days there before taking the train on up the coast. I should mention that we never rented a car while in Italy -- we went everywhere by train, bus, and taxi. And we did a lot of walking!

Monteroso and its beach.

By 2005 I was only into my second year with digital cameras and carried a pair of Canon EOS 20Ds with an assortment of lenses (too many, actually) on this trip. The lens most used was the Canon EF 24-85 f3.5-4/5. I also carried a Sigma 14mm lens, which was valuable because it gave a 21mm field of view on the APS-C sensor of the 20D. The only full-frame cameras available at that time were the Canon EOS 1Ds and 1DsII, both far beyond my budget.

We had heard much about a place called Cinque Terra (it literally means "The Five Lands"), five villages on Italy's northwest cost which are also part of a national park and an UNESCO World Heritage Site. We spent the night in a hotel in Livorno and arrived in Monteroso, northernmost of the villages, the next day. We quickly found a place to stay, and set out to explore. And also, of course, to find something to eat!

Monteroso is surrounded on three

sides by terraced mountains.

Besides Monteroso, the other villages are (going south) Vernazza, Corniglia, Manorola, and Riomaggiore. They are built at the base of mountains rising out of the sea, and Monteroso, Vernazza, and Riomaggiore are actually built in ravines coming down the mountanside. That has been the cause of some serious flooding and destruction on occasion. The mountansides, by the way, are fully terraced with vineyards.

The houses in Riomaggiore are almost built on top

of each other on the steep sides of a ravine

going down to the water.

 Monteroso has a very nice, although not large, beach, and Louise, ever the beach bunny was eager to get in some sun-time. We both are also inveterate explorers, and on our second day there she talked me into walking up and over the mountain to Vernazza. She obviously has no respect for the elderly! But it was well worth it.

To be continued. . .

Blog Note: I'm taking a temporary break from the "Photographers You Should Know series. They are time-consuming and sometimes difficult to write, and I have quite a bit on my plate right now. But we'll be back with more soon. Next up: James Ravilious.

(Photographs copyright David B. Jenkins 2020)

Soli Deo Gloria

To the glory of God alone

 

Photographers You Should Know: An Encounter with Fritz Henle

Fritz Henle

About age 70.

Blog Note: Retired architect John Donald Walters, who was born in Canada, grew up in New Mexico, and has spent most of his life in Australia, responded to my notice on the Rangefinder Forum  of my series of blog posts about Fritz Henle with a lovely story of meeting Henle in Bermuda while a 19-year-old aspiring photographer on his first trip abroad. His narrative tells us that Henle was very much the kind of person his photographs reveal him to have been. Don has kindly given me permission to publish his account on this blog. I would love to also publish some of the pictures he took on that Bermuda trip, but unfortunately they are stored 800 kilometers away and he won't be able to get to them until at least June. If time hasn't taken too great a toll on those 54-year-old color negatives, we will revisit this again with some of his pictures.

In 1966 I was on my first overseas trip from Canada, five days in Bermuda. On day one I took my Yashica D and some color film and went walkabout, on the hunt for the usual trite tourist images every photographer made in that era. Mr. Henle had just finished a photo shoot on a nearby beach. When he had packed up his Rolleis we had a long conversation about photography, cameras, film and shooting, which led to coffee and a late breakfast at his hotel, introduction to his beautiful and charming wife, and a detailed inspection of my portfolio of distinctly inferior printed snaps.

For a photographer of his reputation and standing he was amazingly kind to this 19-year old photographer with a downmarket camera. I doubt my snapshots - in those days I always had a small portfolio album with me - greatly impressed him, but he looked at everything and made many kind and positive suggestions for me to improve my compositions, check various angles before clicking off a frame (in those days I took only one or two shots of any subject), and let me check out his Rollei kit, a 2.8F and a 3.5F. He gave me a copy of one of his books (I have it in storage so cannot check the title) which he autographed and generously refused my offer to pay for it.

That year I bought a Rollei 3.5E2 which I still have and use. As much as I would like to say Mr. Henle's good advice greatly improved my photography, it took me a few more years and much experimenting before I began to develop my own vision and find my way in the genre.

His best advice to me was not to copy others (not even him!) but to look for images of my own making of subjects I was most interested in. Until then I had shot mostly weddings, conventional studio portraits and news photos. I started exploring new subjects that interested me and found I was gravitating to old buildings and environmental work. Ultimately my career path took me out of news media and studio imagery to 'art' subjects and eventually to architecture (I qualified as an architect in interior design in 1990).

Interesting how a haphazard encounter with one person and the right words of encouragement could have such positive effects on one's life. I have always been thankful to Mr. Henle for the time he took to talk to me and give me his good advice, most of which I have tried to follow in my decades as a photographer.

(John Donald Walters text copyright 2020)

Soli Deo Gloria
For the glory of God alone