'Found Art: 1d Book' - A signed, limited edition inkjet print with silkscreen glazes by Sir Peter Blake. Printed at Coriander Studios, published by CCA Galleries.

The Found Art series continues with this exuberant cover from a ‘dime novel’. Frank Reade was the protagonist of a series of dime novels published primarily for boys. The four Frank Reade stories concerned adventures with the character's inventions, various robot-like mechanisms powered by steam. A very long series of juvenile novels followed which featured the son of Frank Reade, Frank Reade Jr., as its teenaged inventor-hero. These stories were written by Luis P. Senarens (1865–1939) with the pseudonym Noname. Frank Reade Jr.’s inventions included airships, submersibles, steam-driven and electrical land vehicles, and steam-powered robots- as seen here with the ‘Steam Horse’. The Frank Reade stories are perhaps the best known of the many boys' invention fiction series published in America during the later 19th century.


The choice of such a subject is typical of Blake’s oeuvre; combining a nostalgia for childhood objects, an interest in popular entertainment and the use of rare printed materials from him personal collection.