For us living overseas Saul Bass is perhaps the most impressive American illustrator. I really love his class touch in Hitchcock's or Preminger's movies, for instance, so a "definitive study" is really really welcome:
Saul Bass: A Life in Film & Design Jennifer Bass and Pat Kirkham 1484 illustrations (wow!!!!!!!!) 440 pages
Designed by Saul Bass's daughter Jennifer and written by distinguished design historian Pat Kirkham, who knew Saul Bass, this book contains more than 1,400 illustrations, many from the Bass archive and never published before, providing an in-depth account of one of the leading graphic artists of the 20th century.
How much is it. Looks like it could be a very dollars.
I purchased it on Amazon for $47.25. Oddly, per Amazon right now, the book is unavailable and "under review."
According to them, While this item is available from other marketplace sellers on this page, it is not currently offered by Amazon.com because customers have told us there may be something wrong with our inventory of the item, the way we are shipping it, or the way it's described here. (Thanks for the tip!)
We're working to fix the problem as quickly as possible.
I've bumped this, not only because of that wonderfully ingenious spoof of Star Wars, but because I saw the book on sale in Waterstones today. It's a little under £50 and quite weighty.
I had no idea Bass had done so much design, particularly for corporate america, let alone the film titles. The foreword is by Martin Scorsese who basically says Bass acted as something of a signpost so that anyone would know where they are now in addition to where they are going. In other words, Bass was and is an icon of comfort and identity.
