A collection of original design elements for Frank Zappa’s autobiography The Real Frank Zappa Book (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1989) including first concept layouts for the cover executed in ink on paper; hand rendered mock-ups; three photographic prints originally intended for inclusion but later removed (including a membership certificate from The United Mutations of Laurel Canyon); a pen and ink illustration on vellum paper depicting The Mothers of Invention; a signed letter from publishing VP Ann E. Patty; and 19 hand rendered ink on vellum paper chapter headings modeled at Zappa’s request after the typography of early schoolbook primers.

Largest, 20 by 16 inches, unframed



Frank Zappa