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[CENTRAL ASIAN ARCHITECTURE] Arkhitekturnyi ornament Srednei Azii [i.e. Architectural Ornament of Central Asia]

Denike, B.

Moscow: Izd. Vsesoiuznoi Akademii arkhitektury, 1939. Item #1176

228 pp.: ill. 26,5x18 cm. In original full cloth with colored lettering on the spine and the front cover. Covers soiled and slightly rubbed, otherwise very good and clean internally.

First and only edition. One of 2500 copies. Scarce.
A valuable source on architectural decoration traditions in Samarkand, Bukhara, Merv, Termez, Uzgen, Samarra, Tashkent, settlements of Iran, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan.
The book by a well-known art historian Boris Denike (1885-1941) who headed Soviet archaeological expeditions to Central and Western Asia, including a mission to ancient Termez. In 1927-1928 Denike was a director of the Museum of East Cultures (Moscow). Even earlier he published the first Russian book on the art history of the medieval Muslim countries - ‘The Art of the East’ (Kazan, 1923). He was one of the key figures contributing to Soviet exploration of Central Asian history and art.
The work contains more than 200 photographs depicting original decoration of Central and Western Asian architecture. They feature walls, windows and columns of temples, shrines, private houses of wealthy people built in the 10th - 15th centuries and designed with wood, stone, terracotta, plaster carving, tile cladding and frescoes. They supplemented Denike’s analyses of materials, patterns and techniques used. A full list of illustrations is printed at the end of the book.

Worldcat shows copies located in LoC, Princeton, Columbia, Indiana, Chicago, Harvard, California, New York, Michigan and Washington Universities, Getty Institute.

Price: $950.00