[.ca] The Essential Rene Lalique (ISBN 0810958368)

Lalique Illustrations:
As the author of the Essential Rene Lalique, I'd like to address the issue Mark Waller raised in his review at Amazon.com concerning the images used in the book. Abrams and its partner, Wonderland Press, chose not to use the list of images I submitted with my manuscript, and they also chose not to inform me of their selections. The first time I saw the illustrations was when they sent me a copy of the published book. I too share his frustration at this missed opportunity to present better material.

Harry Abrams what happened!:
A Book on the antiques field that proclaims on its back cover "be an expert in 5 minutes" (only), has a long way to go to impress me, it has to be said. However the author plainly knows his 20th century glass history and has done his homework on the man, but clearly does not know Lalique' s work or glass. The photos are the same old Christie image collection that might work for an auction catalogue but are dangerously out of context in the hands of an academic. The Images duplicate many of the cataloging errors of the worst type by a junior at Christies-one caption -Car ornaments, perfume bottles and an ink well. All in all I was sad that Harry N Abrams whose son was a client of mine, who once quoted his father as saying "you should get a hernia taking one of my books off the shelf!" Has, as a first step into a book on this great artist , chosen to produce this diminutive disappointment.