Artelibro presents Bologna 2010: XXXIX Congress of the International Association of Antiquarian Booksellers
In September 2010 it will be up to Italy to host the 39th Congress of International Association of Antiquarian Booksellers and will be ALAI, the Italian Association of Antiquarian Booksellers (http://www.alai.it), to handle the organization. The event will take place in Bologna, through a series of meetings and visits to libraries and places of art that will reach the nearby cities of Parma Ravenna, Modena Ferrara etc., Culminating in the Exhibition of Ancient and Modern Prestigious Book in Bologna, during Artelibro Art Book Festival d’art, involving many of the best known antiquarian booksellers around the world.
The Congress and relative show are a commitment that the Association’s member countries must take every two years, and have always been a privileged moment of encounter that allows booksellers not only to discuss and investigate issues related to their profession and the antiquarian market, but to know personally, establish relationships of friendship, exchange information, agree on common initiatives, both business and cultural.
The L.I.L.A. / I.L.A.B. – with due precedence to the French acronym (Ligue Internationale de la Librairie Ancienne), then to the English one (International League of Antiquarian Booksellers), as it is French the original editing of the “Collection of customs and habits” to which more than 2,000 antiquarian booksellers scattered in every continent must be based on – is a true “Internazionale” of culture, an association that abolishes borders and difference of race, nationality or religion, with its own code of ethics, its traditions and its history, similar to some extent to the secret societies of the Enlightenment period, uniting different people and cultures in the insigna “Amor librorum Nos Unit”. It is not uncommon, for example, that a young person before commencing a career of his father go abroad to practice with a partner colleague: internationalism is an essential dimension to this so fascinating but limited world, as it turns mainly to Museums and public institutions, a few wealthy collectors and a chosen audience of scholars and enthusiasts who succeed with acuity and intelligence to form highly significant collections, despite the constant increase in prices.
This does not mean that you cannot buy ancient and rare books, and this is what you can see by visiting the exhibition concurrent with the Congress, where next to incredible treasures there will be rare books affordable for all budgets. After all, if the Internet allows us to absorb a first amount of information previously unthinkable and to produce culture in a very short time without the help of books, nothing can ever replace the joy of flicking through a book, to keep it between your hands and meditate it. Especially when we know its history and importance, if not an illustrious provenance drawn by an autograph, a binder, from an ex-libris. The happiness that a rare book offers us is inexhaustible because it communicates us not only a thought but also its world, and it is as if our lives become more meaningful and wonderful. There is nothing sadder than a house without books.
Category: Artelibro News
