Up for auction is a copy of Pop Art: A Continuing History, an oversized, richly illustrated volume written by the American-born art historian and independent curator Marco Livingstone (born 1952) and published in 1990 by Harry N. Abrams, Inc., New York. I believe this is an unstated first edition of this massive, handsome book, which was printed and bound in Japan -- and features all the usual suspects in Pop Art, as well as earlier precursors and influences and later Neo-Pop artists.

The blue cloth-bound title has vivid yellow titling on its spine (the same yellow as the end pages) and comes with its original dust jacket / wrapper (which has no price on it). It measures approximately 11-1/4 inches square and comprises 272 pages. As it reads at the bottom of the jacket's front flap, the book contains "366 illustrations, including 300 plates in full color."

Here's the description of the book as printed on the front flap of the jacket:

Pop artists’ brilliant blending of the banal and the mythic created the most genuinely popular movement in modern art. This first comprehensive history of Pop in over twenty years charts the international development of this exhilarating style, once challenged as a betrayal of the basic tenets of modernism, and illustrates – in 300 color plates – the work of more than 130 artists, much of which is previously unpublished.

Pop art has outlived its early detractors, and today, more than thirty years later, its serious, provocative intent is no longer in doubt. Embracing consumer culture in its attention to commercial and brand-name products (Coca-Cola, Campbell’s Soup), comic strips (Dick Tracy, Mickey Mouse), and movie stars (Marilyn Monroe), Pop expanded the range of artists’ imagery and technique to the broadest possible level. The many varieties of Pop produced by its leading proponents – such as Warhol, Lichtenstein, Rosenquist, Oldenburg, and Johns – have in turn given birth to rich subsequent developments in the 1970s and 80s with the arrival of a younger generation of artists who continue to be deeply indebted to Pop’s attitudes, form, and subject matter.

Pop Art offers a new perspective on the movement with a fully documented critical history that unravels the sequence of events associated with the evolution of Pop in the United States, Great Britain, and Europe drawn in part from extensive interviews with contemporary artists. It is the most authoritative study available on this intriguing movement.

And here’s a profile of the author, as printed on the back flap:

Marco Livingstone is currently Deputy Editor of the 19th- and 20th- century entries for the Macmillan Dictionary of Art. He was Assistant Keeper of British Art at the Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool, from 1976 to 1982, and Deputy Director of the Museum of Modern Art, Oxford, until 1986. The organizer of touring retrospective exhibitions of the work of David Hockney, Allen Jones, Patrick Caulfield, Peter Phillips, Stephen Buckley, and Duane Michals, Livingstone is also the author of the accompanying catalogues to these exhibitions as well as of monographs on Jones, Hockney, and R. B. Kitaj.

Here are the book’s Contents, as listed on pages 5 and 6 (leaving out the page numbers):

PREFACE

THE FOUNDATIONS OF POP

1 Coca-Cola Plan: Johns, Rauschenberg and American prototypes of Pop in the 1950s

2 Just What Is It? The Independent Group and Peter Blake

3 Bourgeois Trash: Nouveau Réalisme and precursors of Pop in Europe

CLASSIC POP

4 Look Mickey: American Pop, 1960-62

5 The Artist Thinks: The Royal College of Art, 1959-63

6 One-Dollar Bills: American Pop, 1962-4

7 Moderne Kunst: European Pop, 1960s and after

POP’S MATURITY

8 Random Illusion: British Pop from the 1960s to the 1980s

9 Extinguished Match: American Pop, 1965 and after

LEGACIES OF POP

10 Eat Dirt Art History: Neo-Pop in the 1980s

Notes

Select Bibliography

List of Illustrations and Credits

Index

On pages 262 to 264 is a list of (most of) the artists covered in the book. Here are their names, in alphabetical order by surname (apologies for not including all the diacritics on the names):

Adami, Valerio

Arman, Martin

Arroyo, Eduardo

Artschwager, Richard

Baj, Enrico

Barker, Clive

Basquiat, Jean-Michel

Bengston, Billy Al

Berman, Wallace

Bidlo, Mike

Blais, Jean-Charles

Blake, Peter

Boshier, Derek

Brecht, George

Broodthaers, Marcel

Buckley, Stephen

Carter, Tony,

Caulfield, Patrick

César

Chamberlain, John

Christo

Combas, Robert

Cragg, Tony

Craig-Martin, Michael

Crowley, Graham

D’Arcangelo, Allan

Deschamps, Gérard

Dine, Jim

Donagh, Rita

Donaldson, Anthony

Equipo Cronica

Erro

Estes, Richard

Fahlstrom, Oyvind

Farthing, Stephen

Fischl, Eric

Goode, Joe

Grooms, Red

Hains, Raymond

Hairy Who

Halley, Peter

Hamilton, Richard

Hanson, Duane

Haring, Keith

Haworth, Jann

Henderson, Nigel

Hilliard, John

Hockney, David

Holzer, Jenny

Indiana, Robert

Jacquet, Alain

Jess

Johns, Jasper

Johnson, Ray  

Jones, Allen

Kaprow, Allan

Katz, Alex

Kienholz, Ed

Kitaj, R. B.

Klapheck, Konrad

Klein, Yves

Komer and Melamid

Koons, Jeff

Kruger, Barbara

Laing, Gerald

Lancaster, Mark

Lavier, Bertrand

Levine, Sherrie

Lichtenstein, Roy

Lindner, Richard

McCollum, Allan

Mach, David

Marisol

Milroy, Lisa

Monory, Jacques

Monro, Nicholas

Morley, Malcolm

Ohtake, Shinro

Oldenburg, Claes

Opie, Julian

Oxtoby, David

Paolozzi, Eduardo

Phillips, Peter

Phillips, Tom

Pistoletto, Michelangelo

Polke, Sigmar

Ramos, Mel

Rancillac, Bernard

Rauschenberg, Robert

Raysse, Martial

Richter, Gerhard

Rivers, Larry

Rosenquist, James

Rotella, Mimmo

Ruscha, Edward

Saint Phalle, Niki de

Salle, David

Saul, Peter

Scharf, Kenny

Segal, George

Self, Colin

Sherman, Cindy

Smith, Richard

Spoerri, Daniel

Stampfil, Peter

Stankiewicz, Richard

Steinbach, Haim

Taaffe, Philip

Télémaque, Hervé

Thiebaud, Wayne

Tilson, Jake

Tilson, Joe

Trockel, Rosemary

Vaisman, Meyer

Villeglé, Jacques de la

Vilmouth, Jean-Luc

Vostell, Wolf

Warhol, Andy

Wentworth, Richard

Wesley, John

Wesselmann, Tom

Westermann, H. C.

Whitman, Robert

Wieland, Joyce

Woodrow, Bill

Yokoo, Tadanori

The overall condition of this cloth-bound hardcover title, which comes with its original dust jacket / wrapper, is very good. There’s some minor chipping, smudging, spotting, discoloration (at and around the spine) of the glossy jacket, but otherwise it’s in great shape. The blue cloth binding, with bright yellow titling on the spine only, is in very good to excellent shape. The pages within are in very good to excellent shape as well, with no annotations, marginalia, underlining, scribbles, etc., seen, nor any major damage or flaws in the way of clipped or missing pages, large tears, tape repairs, water or other liquid damage, etc. The page edges are all smooth cut, uncolored, clean, and unmarked. The book has neither a musty nor smoky odor.

This unstated first-edition illustrated book, Pop Art: A Continuing History, by Marco Livingstone, is being sold AS IS, AS DESCRIBED ABOVE AND PICTURED WITHIN. I am setting what I feel is a very reasonable starting price for the auction, and there is NO RESERVE. I am also including a Buy It Now price.

Shipping and handling for the title, which weighs over 4 pounds: $7 to U.S. addresses (via Media Mail).

Note that eBay has now instituted a shipping program whereby bidders from outside the U.S. can bid on or buy all sellers' items, and the seller sends everything to an eBay facility in the US for shipping. So far, this seems to be working out well (though one item bought by someone in China never made it to its destination, though eBay very quickly refunded the buyer).  

If you want this book sent more quickly to you (e.g., via Priority Mail in the U.S.), you must request this asap after winning or purchasing it (or beforehand, if possible), and I will adjust the amount accordingly.

I will do my best to send the book out to you no more than 2-3 business days following receipt of payment (that is, when eBay informs me that your payment has been posted to or otherwise cleared in my account). 

If you are the winner or buyer of this richly illustrated title on Pop art, PAYMENT IS EXPECTED WITHIN ONE WEEK (7 DAYS) FROM THE PURCHASE DATE. If you cannot pay within this time frame, PLEASE contact me asap so we can work something out. I'm very flexible and understanding, but I would appreciate communication from you one way or another.

PLEASE NOTE THAT RETURNS WILL NOT BE ACCEPTED NOR REFUNDS MADE FOR THIS BOOK, SO PLEASE READ MY DESCRIPTION CAREFULLY, LOOK CLOSELY AT THE PHOTOGRAPHS I’VE UPLOADED, AND ASK ME ANY QUESTIONS YOU MAY HAVE ABOUT THE CONTENTS OR CONDITION OF THE ITEM. THANKS FOR YOUR UNDERSTANDING!

Thanks for looking, and please don't hesitate to email me if you have any questions about Marco Livingstone’s Pop Art: A Continuing History, published in 1990 by Abrams.  

PLEASE NOTE THAT, IF POSSIBLE, I WILL HAPPILY ADJUST SHIPPING CHARGES FOR MULTIPLE PURCHASES!!! (THIS DOES NOT APPLY TO SALES FROM OUTSIDE THE U.S. AT THIS TIME.)

ALSO, NOTE THAT, IF APPLICABLE, eBAY WILL ADD ANY APPROPRIATE STATE SALES TAX TO THE INVOICE.