Magick makes dreams real, makes the impossible possible, focuses the will. Throughout its history, crystals, water, polished metal, mirrors have been used to oracular ends. Spare’s massive achievement is that he recognized the potential of Art, of image, to be the most powerful image of all. A window in Time, an interface with death. In his art he captures not just an image but a life-form and energy. What happens is that this lies dormant until it comes into contact and reacts with other energies: the viewer. Primal, atavistic man knew this and invested his ideas/images with unrestricted power; when you deal with image only, as with 20th century art, you don’t get anything back except aesthetics. Spare has achieved the previously impossible, a two-way communication where his image reacts to and with us. . . . What this energy held within his images is doing is transcending the barriers of Time; so that what we are dealing with is a four-dimensional object or image. This form of energy will have existed at all times and will exist at all times.
— Genesis P-Orridge, from Rapid Eye 1
“Austin Spare was an explorer of the imagination and the Unconscious and perfected a form of Surrealist automatism some 10 years before Breton and Dali. Includes 17 illustrations by Spare.”
Publisher: Holmes
Paperback
Illustrated
“One of the most haunting creations from the hand of this artist—an important sketchbook of immensely powerful line drawings from 1924 which directly communicates that peculiar ecstatic energy which is at the heart of the cultus of which Spare was an adept. The volume includes a prophetic excerpt from Spare’s unpublished writings.”
Publisher: Holmes
Hardback
Illustrated
In three volumes:
Volume 1: The Writings and Images of Austin Osman Spare
Includes “To A. O. S.” (a poem by Aleister Crowley), “Austin O. Spare” (from Adventures With Inspiration by Hannen Swaffer), “Sex in Art” (from Ideas and People by Clifford Bax), “Earth Inferno,” “A Book of Satyrs,” “The Book of Pleasure,” “The Focus of Life,” “Anathema of Zos” by Austin Spare, “Automatic Drawing” by Austin Spare and Frederick Carter and more.
Volume 2: Austin Osman Spare—The Artist’s Books 1905-1927
Dr. W. Wallace
This volume is an analysis of the five books: Earth Inferno (1905), The Book of Pleasure (1913), The Anathema of Zos (1927), A Book of Satyrs (1907 and 1909) and The Focus of Life (1921). “The books constitute an interconnected developmental sequence within which the artist pursues and refines certain major themes, exhaustively exploring allegorical method. This leads to the evolution of a method of symbolic automatism which is presented as the praxis of the evolving cosmology, mysticism and world view developing directly from Earth Inferno.”
Volume 3: Michelangelo in a Teacup—
The Intimate Life of Austin Osman Spare
Frank Letchford
Publisher: Holmes
Hardback: 1208 pages
Illustrated
“Through a lifetime of experiment with divination, Spare evolved his thesis of the continuity of consciousness between past, present and future. In these two works, he demonstrates the power of traditional sorcery to liberate perception from the limitations of time and suggests the means evolving a personal Alphabet of Desire. Illustrated with examples of Spare’s experiments in divination.”
Publisher: Holmes
Hardback
Illustrated
“Spare’s powerful and idiosyncratic art masks a philosophy of arcane beauty often overlooked. In this work, his personal systems are explored, clarified and augmented with the artist’s own words. Also, this volume offers excerpts from Spare’s last unpublished grimoire, The Logomachy of Zos, along with the earliest text of The Book of Pleasure. This clearly demonstrates the strength and consistency of his vision throughout his life.”
Publisher: Holmes
Hardback
Illustrated