The Face of the World. An International Scrapbook of People and Places

Cecil Beaton.

Weidenfeld and Nicolson. London. 1957. First edition. Hardback, quarto; light-blue cloth-bound boards, backed with dark-blue cloth, with gilt title to spine, dust jacket. 240 pages. Extensively illustrated with photographs and text illustrations, on various coloured paper stock. English. 285 x 225mm. 1.2kg. . Good, in fair dust jacket; shelf wear to jacket, light wear to edges and forecorners, areas of loss to head and base of spine, tear to front fold, browning to spine, some soiling and spot marks to rear panel, some neat tape repairs to verso, price-clipped; slight wear to boards, slight bump to top forecorner. From the library of the English actor Edna Wood, with her large dated ink inscription to the front free endpaper.

The Face of the World is a scrapbook and compilation of 'a decade of revival', a demonstration of how art and culture had been revitalised after the war years. It contains a mixture of photographs, drawings, and extracts from journals and published articles produced by Beaton in the years from 1945-1956. ‘People… Places… Pleasures… All come under the engaging scrutiny of Cecil Beaton’s camera, brush and pen.’ The title and subtitle of the book (An International Scrapbook of People and Places) reflects the global outlook of the contents. There are articles on London, Paris, New York, Sicily, and Tokyo laid out on hotel notepaper and the ‘Travel Album’ spreads reproduce photographs taken on visits around the world. The portrait photographs likewise demonstrate an international cast of creatives. The usual suspects are there (including Christian Bérard, Picasso, Diana Cooper, Colette, the Royal Family, Evelyn Waugh, Nancy Mitford and Winston Churchill), but Beaton was keen to ensure that the book was up to the minute and so included images of several contemporary stars, such as Albert Camus, Truman Capote, Audrey Hepburn, Marilyn Monroe, Maria Callas, Marlon Brando, Lucian Freud and Francis Bacon.