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Artists' Books / Book Arts : Artists' Books by Medium
This guide describes artworks which use the book as medium. Additional resources describe the history of this field, the different methods used to create and publish these works, as well as links showing where these books can be found at UW-Madison.
- Artists' Books at UW-Madison
- Researching the Book Arts
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Artists' books: Medium
Artists' books can be (and have been!) made from almost anything. Frequently, they consist of found or handmade materials, coming together in familiar forms. Tab through this page to view some artists' books made using common materials and methods.
- Desire by Halah KhanPublication Date: 2022"When houses are abandoned, the trees stay and provide shade to the ghosts, they remain to tell stories of the residents, an endless repetition of history that no one wants to explore. Searching for a home you turn around a corner, you see a light that reminds of a softness, hands, eyes, a love forgotten, a poem lost... humay chahiye tha milna kisi ehd e mehrbaan mein. Another rain, everything blooms, nothing survives, all that lives is your laughter, forever echoing off the walls of my tired heart, it haunts, I made a home out of her memories, her smile, the sound of her payal. Everything rots, dar o deewar se tapkey hai bayabaan hona... I brought ruin to my home with words I never said, with love I never gave, I slept through the days and life rushed past me, everything goes to waste, we laugh, we love, we live... purr hai saayee ki tarah mera shabistaan mujh se...-- Booklyn.org
- Transpose = Tahawool by Islam AlyPublication Date: 2021"'Transpose' is a bilingual book in English and Arabic that investigates talismanic shirts. A worn textile that was believed to offer protection and guidance to the carrier. Historically there were various uses for the talismanic shirts; they could be worn as a shield in battles, during illness, used as protective amulets, and produced for ceremonial purposes. They would have a distinctive vocabulary, a mixture of religious texts, sacred invocations, symbols, magic squares, and seal markings. In 'Transpose', seven pamphlets taking the shapes of shirts are designed and enclosed in the box. Each invokes a different wish: Power, Celebration, Magic, Prosperity, Affection, Peace, and Health. 'Transpose' reveals how garments embed our backgrounds, experiences, decisions, and memories allowing us to live through each garment. The book challenges the notion of power and privilege. Traditionally, these shirts were dedicated to the elite and kept protected in drawers and boxes. Transpose makes these wishes unrestricted for viewers to be rearranged and reordered in various ways according to their preference. After taking away all the pamphlets, the viewer can read a quote on the inner side of the box, emphasizing a greater meaning to each shirt." --Islam Aly
- Fairmont Color Cards: FCC by Sarah BryantPublication Date: 2021"Fairmont Color Card is an exploration of the roles of textile, color, and fashion in the origin story of landfill culture. Text for the project was culled from 1977-1978 Home Furnishing Color Card, produced by The Color Association of the United States, Inc. and The Wastemakers, written by Vance Packard in 1960. Designed and produced between 2019 and 2021, the project began in one place and ended in another. Materials for this project include my sheets, my clothes, and thread color matched to these textile samples the walls, hair, and skin found in my home. Produced in an edition of twenty copies, the fabric collages included in this project are all identical save for one, the card titled "the significance of these private worlds," which is unique to each copy."
- Cut Your Nose Off to Spite Your Face by Jaeyoung BaePublication Date: 2015Canvas accordion fold structure with four zipper closures and multiple felt panels with hand-stitched lettering and images.
- Common Threads. Volume 143 by Candace HicksPublication Date: 2022One-of-a-kind, embroidered, hand sewn artist's book by Candace Hicks. Cover embroidered with a pattern of blue vertical human silhouettes of various sizes, on front and back covers, with a black fabric spine. Interior embroidered with blue and red embroidery thread to mimic lined notebook pages. Text embroidered in black. An embroidered image of a banana is on page 7.
- Handmade Paper: Fiber Exposed by Eugenie BarronPublication Date: 2012COLOPHON: "This portfolio was printed by Linemark, Upper Marlboro, Maryland, on Cougar Opaque Text paper in Garamond types. The Canson wrappers were letterpress printed by Steve Miller. The image on the wrapper and title page was pulled from the work entitled Samandoque, by Karla Elling.
Judi Conant completed the binding and made the boxes."
- Chasing Paper by Claudia CohenPublication Date: 2007The third volume of bookbinder Claudia Cohen's ongoing series of books borne from her lifetime passion for papers of all kinds. The book contains over 300 samples, from scraps to full fold-out sheets, all imaginatively combined and arranged. In broad categories, the papers include (to name a few) money, pre-20th century wallpaper, consumable packages, marbled, handmade, and labels, all varying in sizes from small scraps to full sheets. Each copy is laced into a heavy paper wrap (some white, some dark gray) featuring multi-color paper strips woven through the front board, and issued in a cloth-covered clamshell box.
- The Birch Chase, Or, How Papermaking Can Be Done in Any Home by Rez' LingenPublication Date: 1979COLOPHON: "Special thanks and colophon.
Thanks to John Risseeuw, Deb C. Schoenfelder, Sylvia Wheeler, and Kathy Bombera for their help.
This book was written, hand set, printed, and bound by Ruth Lingen in September & October of 1979. It was printed in USD's type shop using Clearface Heavy on Niddegan paper. The first 12 books in the edition have paper samples made by the author."
- Convenience Store by Caryl Luise HerfortPublication Date: 1991
- Mycorrhizae by Jillian M. SicoPublication Date: 2020COLOPHON: "Mycorrhizae is a collaboration between Jillian Sico and Katie Beidler. It was printed on a Vandercook no. 4 press in Tuscaloosa, Alabama by Jillian Sico of Frogsong Press. Type and images are from photopolymer plates and wood veneer. The typeface is Baskerville.
All paper for this edition was made by hand outdoors and in the Lost Arch Paper Mill at The University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa from linen, flax, Alabama kozo, recycled cotton & flax, and polypore mushrooms.
Many thanks to my advisors, Anna Embree, Sarah Bryant, Kyle Holland, and Bob Ritter, and to Tim Pfitzer, Doug Baulos, Ruth Stokes, Sarah Scarr, Sam Boring, Josh Dugat, Uzziel Perez, Alexa Tullett and my family. Much gratitude to my research site, the Cohutta Wilderness, and to those who study and tend to it."
- Canto a Matanzas by Carilda Oliver LabraPublication Date: 2014A color landscape of Matanzas is seen through the scalloped opening in the front flap of the portfolio, which is decorated with a photographic reproduction of floral patterned lace; a decorative paper collage of the Vigía lantern adorns the back of the portfolio. The handwritten poem is reproduced between decorative borders on the front of the banner, which folds and ties with package ribbon.
- Death Comes on Swift Wings by Christopher WildePublication Date: 1994COLOPHON: "Wings of freedom and caskets on wheels provide icons for this birth through death journey. An American Life (tm) represented in images that make up our visual associations. This edition of ten books features hand made blue jean paper made by M. Robert Wagner and LisaBeth [sic] Robinson. The end sheets are blue prints of the Madison sewers found in a dumpster dive. Bound in a modified pamphlet stitch, these books have three toner registered Xerox prints and rubber stamped text. The covers were painted, plastic embossed (thermographed), and sealed in lacquer red on folder weight paper, and a cut away frontice [sic] image of Mr. Vitallo disguised as death. A novel approach to narrative, with plenty of hands-on-attention."
- Control Mechanism by Clifton MeadorPublication Date: 2020This work uses coarse line screens to print photographic images and the instrumentality of representation becomes more interesting than the illusions it attempts to create. The placement of the typography echoes the angles of the line screens and the ghosts of former workers only exists in this work as very blurry typographic forms. I printed this book on an offset press, one color at a time--a process something like factory labor." --Clifton Meador
- The Universal Raisin Cake Theory: A Cosmic Mix! by Alyce SantoroPublication Date: 2005This book object takes the form of an unfolded cake mix box. The box (or poster, if left flat) is inscribed with a metaphor commonly used by astrophysicists to describe the way the universe is expanding. It also includes a recipe and philosophical commentary.
- Choice by Camden M. RichardsPublication Date: 2017"I collaborated with Marguerite Richards, a writer and woman just beginning the process of choosing motherhood. With our words (the "before" and "after" of choice) serving as bookends, at the center is a vintage illustration of mother earth, but with her baby separated from her, designating the reproductive choice that is literally again hanging in the balance, cut out and dissected in the public arena. The debate, the noise, and the chatter of the outside world and the language that serves to defend this "right" (constitutional amendments, women's manifestos, ACLU briefing papers) is juxtaposed against the quiet interior landscape of this very personal and private choice, with simple poems and symbolic images. On the outside, each of our eyes, printed on paper vellum, is ever present, looking out from the inside and looking in from the outside, watching, intently."--Publisher's website
Printmaking is a broad category that includes several processes including both hand-crafted and digital. Some common printmaking techniques that are represented in the Artists' Book Collection include screenprinting, linocut, letterpress, offset, and digital printing.
- City by Thomas Parker WilliamsPublication Date: 2019COLOPHON: "10 accordion panels, two covers, and end papers printed from reduction linocut plates, 60 total color changes, ink-dry pigments and burnt plate oil. Paper - Stonehenge white and black printed on the Luminice Press. Design, illustration, binding and printing by Thomas Parker Williams. Music composition "City" in 4 parts composed, performed and recorded by Thomas Parker Williams.
"City" was conceived in 2002 as a musical journey through Manhattan. However, the music and design of the book were not successfully completed then. I re-visited the music and book in 2019 and completed the project at the time."
- Diagram of Wind: Architectural Book with Poem by by Barbara TetenbaumPublication Date: 2015COLOPHON: "Diagram of Wind was inspired by readings on wave theory. The audio and tactile experience of turning each page is important to its performance. It is designed to be viewed horizontally on the wood platform or hung vertically on the wall using the small cleat and nails provided. The pages are constructed of various papers -- including silk tissue (gampi), Zerkall Ingres and F-color -- collaged with letterpress-printed images and text from a variety of sources. All design, printing, and binding were done by Barb Tetenbaum with assistance from Amy Lund, Melanie Brauner, Sue Selbie and Anne Tracy. Matt McCalmont designed and produced the wood platforms. Michael Donaghy's poem "Glass" is used with the kind permission of Madeline Paxman."
- One Hundred Excellent Flowers by Clifton MeadorPublication Date: 2019Printed in florescent four-color offset lithography. Post-bound with three metal rivets; issued in die-cut black paper wrapper.
COLOPHON: "On February 27, 1957, Mao Zedong gave a speech titled 'On the Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People.' In this speech, he quoted a poem: 'Let a hundred flowers bloom / Let a hundred schools of thought contend.' His speech invited citizens to voice their opinions and criticisms of the Communist Party. It was followed in the summer of 1957 with the Anti-Rightist movement, where between 300,000 and 550,000 individuals were identified as Rightists -- most of whom were intellectuals, academics, writers and artists. Mao later said the Hundred Flowers movement had enticed the snakes out of their lairs. The majority of those accused of being Rightists were publicly discredited and lost their jobs or worse. Historians argue whether Mao was sincere in his desire to encourage free expression and came to regret it, or if the entire Hundred Flowers movement was a trick to expose his enemies."
- Pistol/Pistil: Botanical Ballistics by Ann KalmbachPublication Date: 1997"This accordion fold book examines the use of ordinary words in both botanical and military context. These definitions are juxtaposed with stories and statistics relating to farming and violence"--Womens' Studio Workshop Archive.
COLOPHON: "Pistol/Pistil Botanical Ballistics was designed and printed by Ann Kalmbach & Tatana Kellner visiting Artists-in-Residence at the University of Southern Maine.
with help from our students: Eric Brewer, Bertelle Brooking, Emily Davidson, Stephanie Driscoll, Wendy Flanders, Johnson Hamilton, Gertrude Havu, Tanya Sweatt
Special thanks to Rose Marasco, Patti Volland, Richard Holleman and faculty and staff at USM from supporting this project. This edition of 100 was silkscreen printed on Mohawk Superfine, UV Ultra and Handmade Abaca Fiber Paper."
- Actaeon by Hannah BatselPublication Date: 2017COLOPHON: "Actaeon was designed, printed and bound by H.M. Batsel in a special edition (numbered one through twenty) and a regular edition (numbered twenty-one through seventy).
"Both editions printed on Mohawk Superfine paper in the summer of 2017 at Sputnik Press in Chicago. All editions are original linoleum cuts drawn and carved by H.M. Batsel. Colophon and title page designed by Drue McCurdy. Many thanks to Angee Lennard and Nicolette Ross of Spudnik Press, and to Kristin and Kurt Batsel. This book is dedicated to Lauren Berg and Drue McCurdy."
For a more expansive illustrated list of terms, visit Printed Matter, Inc.'s printing and binding glossary.