Print collecting rewards technical knowledge more than most fields: telling a lifetime impression from a later restrike, or an etching from a photomechanical reproduction, is a matter of looking closely with the right reference at hand.
The literature divides into identification guides, histories of the main techniques, and catalogues raisonnés of individual printmakers, which number and describe every state of every print.
Where to start
Prints and Visual Communication — William M. Ivins Jr., 1953. A classic argument about what prints did for knowledge.
How to Identify Prints — Bamber Gascoigne, 1986. The practical guide to processes, with magnified details.
A History of Engraving and Etching — Arthur M. Hind, 1923. The long-standard technical history.
The Print in the Western World — Linda C. Hults, 1996. A modern introductory history.
American Prints and Printmakers — Una E. Johnson, 1980. A survey of American printmaking since 1900.
Books on Prints & Printmaking in stock (43)
Lithopinion, No. 18 by Local One, Amalgamated Lithographers of America — $28.49 Lithopinion 18 is the Summer 1970 issue (Volume 5, Number 2) of the quarterly graphic arts and public affairs journal of Local One, Amalgamated Lithographers of America, published in New York.
Prints from Tyler Graphics by Martin Friedman — $9.95 An exhibition catalogue from the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, on prints made at Tyler Graphics, shown 23 September 1984 to 17 March 1985, with text by Martin Friedman.
The Prints of Georges Rouault by Monroe Wheeler — $7.10 The Prints of Georges Rouault by Monroe Wheeler, published by The Museum of Modern Art in 1938.
Werner Drewes: Sixty-Five Years of Printmaking by Martina Roudabush Norelli — $28.50 An exhibition catalogue by Martina Roudabush Norelli, published by the Smithsonian Institution Press for the National Museum of American Art (1984), on sixty-five years of printmaking by Werner Drewes (1899-1985).
Hogarth The Complete Engravings by Burke, Joseph & Colin Caldwell — $20.18 A catalogue of the complete engraved work of William Hogarth (1697-1764) by Joseph Burke and Colin Caldwell, published by Abrams in 1968.
JACOB LAWRENCE: THIRTY YEARS OF PRINTS 1963-1993 by Peter Nesbett — $20.90 Jacob Lawrence: Thirty Years of Prints (1963-1993), a catalogue raisonné published by the University of Washington Press in 1994, with an essay by Patricia Hills and an introduction and catalogue by Peter Nesbett.
Egon Schiele by Alessandra Comini — $7.55 Egon Schiele by Alessandra Comini, published in paperback by George Braziller, New York, in 1976.
DRAWINGS OF REMBRANDT; WITH A SELECTION OF DRAWINGS BY HIS — $9.70 Volume I of Drawings of Rembrandt, the two-volume Dover paperback of 1965, with a selection of drawings by his pupils and followers and an introduction, commentary and supplementary material by Seymour Slive.
The Drawings of Edouard Manet by alain de leiris — $13.16 The Drawings of Edouard Manet by Alain de Leiris (University of California Press, 1969) is a study of the French painter's drawings.
Jasper Johns: Printed Symbols Walker Art Center 1990 — $8.92 Jasper Johns: Printed Symbols, an 89-page catalogue published by the Walker Art Center in 1990, with an introduction by Elizabeth Armstrong, essays by James Cuno and others, and an interview with Jasper Johns by Katrina…
A Treasury of American Prints by Thomas Craven, ed. — $11.61 A Treasury of American Prints, edited by the critic Thomas Craven: a selection of etchings and lithographs by American artists of the 1930s.
XIXth Century Drawings and Watercolors by Jean Selz — $5.72 A survey of nineteenth-century drawings and watercolors by Jean Selz, published by Crown Publishers.
Audubon: Fifty Selections with Commentaries by Roger Tory Peterson — $80.82 Audubon: Fifty Selections with Commentaries, with commentary by the ornithologist and bird artist Roger Tory Peterson.
Rauschenberg Currents art exhibition catalog — $70.99 Rauschenberg Currents, an exhibition catalogue from Dayton's Gallery 12, Minneapolis (1970), on Robert Rauschenberg's Currents series of newspaper-based screenprints.
XXth Century Drawings and Watercolors by Raymond Cogniat — $106.23 XXth Century Drawings and Watercolors by Raymond Cogniat, published by Crown Publishers in 1966.
E. Munch by Frederick B. Deknatel — $14.24 An exhibition catalogue by Frederick B. Deknatel, published by The Minneapolis Institute of Arts in 1950, on the Norwegian painter and printmaker Edvard Munch.
Stephen Parrish (1846-1938) by Vose Galleries — $8.29 A gallery catalogue from Vose Galleries of Boston (1982) on Stephen Parrish (1846-1938), the American painter and etcher.
Henry Moore: Sculpture, Drawings, Prints by Gemma Levine — $13.51 A catalogue from Flanders Contemporary Art on Henry Moore's sculpture, drawings and prints, with Gemma Levine credited.
Der Chinesische Farbendruck by Dr. Julius Kurth — $21.85 Der Chinesische Farbendruck, by Dr. Julius Kurth, published by C. F. Schulz & Co. (1922), in German.
The Lithographs of Childe Hassam A Catalog by Fuller Griffith — $18.05 A catalogue of the lithographs of Childe Hassam (1859-1935), compiled by Fuller Griffith and published in 1980.
Currier & Ives Chronicles of America by John Lowell Pratt — $3.79 Currier & Ives: Chronicles of America, edited by John Lowell Pratt, with an introduction by A. K. Baragwanath, curator of prints at the Museum of the City of New York; this copy carries the Promontory Press imprint.
M. C. Escher The Graphic Work - 1994 — $6.65 M. C. Escher: The Graphic Work, a 1994 edition of the survey of the prints of the Dutch graphic artist Maurits Cornelis Escher (1898-1972).
French Master Drawings Of The Nineteenth Century by Klaus Berger — $6.65 French Master Drawings of the Nineteenth Century by Klaus Berger (Harper & Brothers, 1950) is an illustrated English-language survey of French drawing of the nineteenth century.
Prints : History of an Art by Griffiths — $57.00 A history of printmaking published by Skira and Rizzoli and subtitled History of an Art (about 290 pages), by Michel Melot, Antony Griffiths and Richard S. Field, with the first part translated from the French.
Drawings: French Impressionist by Bohumir Mráz — $10.25 A limited-edition book of French Impressionist drawings by Bohumir Mraz, published by Three M Publishing in 1985 and translated from the German by Christa Tiefenbacher-Hudson (70 pages).
Daumier by Roger Passeron — $11.90 Daumier by Roger Passeron, published in English by Poplar Books in 1986.
Treasury of American Drawings by Slatkin & Shoolman — $8.56 Treasury of American Drawings by Slatkin and Shoolman, published by Oxford University Press in 1947 (first edition).
Swann Galleries Works of Art On Paper 1999 — $8.42 An auction catalogue from Swann Galleries (1999) for a sale of works of art on paper, covering prints, drawings and paintings from the 15th through 20th centuries including old master prints and lithographs.
Johnny Friedlaender — $27.45 Johnny Friedlaender, with an introduction by Max-Pol Fouchet (Touchstone, 1965), in French, on the artist and printmaker Johnny Friedlaender (1912-1992).
HOMAGE TO JOAN MIRO by EDITED BY G. DI SAN LORENZO — $133.00 A tribute volume to the Spanish painter Joan Miró (1893-1983), edited by G. di San Lazzaro and published in 1972 by Tudor, an English-language edition of the Paris art review XXe Siècle's Miró homage issue.