Book Artists

Our newest project is to create a visually interesting sculpture from a book or to create an artist's book. I decided to go the sculpture route. I played around with folding the pages but just wasn't inspired by anything in particular, so at first I was frustrated with the project. I ended up shredding the pages and have since gotten some interesting results from playing around with it. The creative process sometimes proves to be very vexing.

Anyway, I did some research on book arts.

Myself as my grandfather, made of crickets, grass and rain
(image from www.judithhoffman.net)

This is a work by book artist Judith Hoffman. She specializes in art metals, but also makes paper books. She has a series of books entitled "Instruction Manual for a Moon," "Instruction Manual for Stars," and "Instruction Manual for a Heart." They're really cute, which I hope isn't a demeaning term. She uses found objects and creates these little "manuals."

Instruction Manual for a Heart
(www.judithhoffman.net)

Instruction Manual for the Moon
(www.judithhoffman.net)

Instruction Manual for the Stars
(www.judithhoffman.net)

Her paper books I found aren't nearly as interesting. Her metalwork is just something I haven't ever really seen before.

Dinosaur Wave
(www.judithhoffman.net)

But I think this is by far her coolest work:

Oneiro
(www.judithhoffman.net)

It's really well crafted, and really clever, and I really wish I could look at the whole thing. Did I mention that the cover is actually a functioning pinhole camera, and the subsequent pictures are taken from said camera? Pretty sweet.

Moving on...

Shu-Ju Wang is a working artist in Portland, Oregon. She makes really interesting artists books out of objects one really wouldn't expect a book to be made from.

Cradles for Our Memories
(www.fingerstothebone.com)

Now "Cradles for Our Memories" might seem confusing at first glance. What is it? This is her description from her website: "The images are Gocco printed on tulle, a very loose mesh of netting material. When a single printed layer of tulle is viewed, the image is barely visible. But when several layers of the printed tulle are stacked and registered, the image appears." Pillows!

This is another one of her pillow books:

Random Cruelty
(www.fingerstothebone.com)

Then she does things like this:

Pocket Atlas for Travelers
(www.fingerstothebone.com)

This is an account of her journey from Taiwan to California.

Project Sushi
(www.fingerstothebone.com)

"Written as a blog, this [Project Sushi] is an account of the search for Ratwoman, superhero to some and villain to others. Like everything else you read on the web, it comes complete with hyperlinks, errors, deadends, and the content should be taken with a grain of salt" (excerpt from fingerstothebone.com).

Nigrum
(www.fingerstothebone.com)

This one is my favorite of Shu-Ju Wang's. It has three poems on one side and a map of The Banda Islands. I like that the slats can be switched around to see bits of both sides at once, or you can look at them each as a whole.

Also, slats is a great idea! It reminds me of Venetian blinds.

I couldn't find this one on Shu-Ju Wang's website, but I was actually directed there because I found this:

Martha
(www.23sandy.com)

What I like about this one is it's like book times two. Each page is like a letter, and it's interactive. It reminds me of a book series I once read called Griffin and Sabine by Nick Bantock.

(image from amazon.com)

If you haven't read it, I would recommend doing so. The books are filled with really interesting art, and with removable letters and postcards. It's about an "extraordinary correspondence" between two people, Griffin and Sabine. Fascinating, I had completely forgot about this. Let's see if Nick Bantock does any more "book art" type work...

Turns out he does, but it's not like the book artists I was looking at earlier. He makes more books like Griffin and Sabine, all including his original artwork with removable pieces. He also made an interesting pop-up book series, my favorite of which was a pop-up version of Lewis Carroll's "The Jabberwocky."

(image from amazon.com)

But he also does pop-ups of Robin Hood, The Walrus and the Carpenter, There Was an Old Lady, etc.

Wow, what a book arts journey that was. To be honest I'm kind of exhausted, but I'm forever expanding my definition of art, which I've learned is pretty much the focus of Art Foundations.

That question remains, "What makes art?"