Book arts:
artist's books
Walter Battiss Gail Berman Christine
Dixie Stephan Erasmus Alice Goldin Eugene Hön
Mark Kannemeyer/Lorcan White Judith Mason Fiona
Pole Jonah Sack Steven Sack Ruth Sacks and others
25 October – 15 November 2014
The artist’s book has always occupied an
invidious position in the pecking order of the arts, because of its
interdisciplinary nature, straddling both art and literature. Although a
legitimate art form with a long and interesting history, some people still
question its autonomy as primary means of artistic expression. The origins of
the artist’s book as it is known today can convincingly be traced back to the
illuminated manuscript in the Middle Ages.
Since then it has evolved from a
form of illumination, to illustration (especially in the 19th century); from
illustration to experimentation (especially in the 20th century); and from
experimentation to installation, as is evident from many contemporary book art
exhibitions.
Some theorists consider the artist’s book as the form of modernist
artistic expression, pointing out that every major movement in art and
literature, and within all the many avant-garde, experimental movements and
independent groups whose contributions have defined the shape of modernist
artistic activity, has yielded phenomenal artists’ books. These include such
artists as Pierre Bonnard, Henri Matisse, Joan Miro, Max Ernst, Pablo Picasso,
and many more. They laid the foundation of the conceptual and thematic richness
that is nowadays associated with artists’ books.
An artist’s book (or often also referred to as livre
d’artiste) is defined as a book, or book-like object in which an artist has
had a major input beyond illustration or authorship, where the final appearance
of the book owes much to an artist’s interference and/or participation, where
the book is the manifestation of the artist’s creativity, where the book is an
original work of art in itself.
The term livre d’artiste, however, is often
used to refer to large-sized format, elaborately produced and hand-coloured
books, made from rare materials, with virtuoso printing and fine binding,
targeting a sophisticated, elite market.
An exhibition of artists’ books at GALLERY AOP
questions these notions and definitions of this unusual form of art: What is an
original? Does it have to be unique or can the artist also edition the book so
that it is essentially a /multiple? Who is the maker of an artist’s book: the
artist who has the idea, or those who produce the book?
What kind of production
means can be included in this definition? Is an artist’s book restricted to the
codex form (the bound shape, in other words)? What about scrolls? Tablets?
Reeds? The clutch of books at GALLERY AOP engages with these
questions in an interesting way. Some of the artists’ books, for example those
by Judith Mason and Alice Goldin, use unique illustrations to accompany written
texts.
Others, by such artists as Ruth Sacks, alter the words of a well-known
text into visual, not only verbal, representations. Yet other books, like those
by Gail Berman, Christine Dixie, Mark Kannemeyer / Lorcan White and Jonah Sack
are primarily visual, with no verbal reference whatsoever.
Walter Battiss made
book sculptural objects from ordinary books. So does Stephan Erasmus, a
contemporary book artist. Steven Sack, in turn, takes the notion of the
artist’s book to a new level with his bamboo diaries; the various segments of
long pieces of reeds form the basis of a weekly or monthly diary entry
consisting of written and painted elements, as well as of found objects. These
reeds, horizontally displayed, or ‘installed’, form the chapters of an
autobiography. Eugene Hön contributes an interactive artist’s book. Small
wonder some critics refer to artists’ books as a form of “intermedia”!
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