Category: Bookmaking

The Guild of Bookworkers traveling member exhibit, Marking Time, at the SF Main Library was pretty much equally divided between fine bindings (a rebinding and covering of a published book) and artists’ books. For the fine bindings, what was on display was everything the artist did — cover and endsheets. The artists’ books, for the most part, weren’t displayed nearly as well. The descriptions of the books gave tantilizing hints about what was inside, but the viewer was lucky to see even one page!
There was one glorious exception, though. Jessica Spring’s Parts Unknown was arrayed in its own case — opened wide so I could sit on the floor and see all the pictures and read much of the text. According to the description, the photos were “ink-jet printed on handmade abaca (and) varnished”, giving them a transparent quality that was quite fetching. But the fonts she used were the best part. The description says it’s all handset type, but don’t give the names, so I wrote Jessica and asked her what they were — she replied “The script is Dorchester (new from M&H) and the text is Packard (very dirty from my shop) and good old Copperplate. The bottom titling is wood type. Not enough of anything, so there was lots of setting and setting again!” That’s a sample of Dorchester above, see the entire font on fonts.com. Jessica’s book is pictured below. You can find out more about her on her website.

I’ve had lots of friends raise great wads of money for their technology ideas from venture capital firms — but raising a few thousand dollars to bank roll an artist’s book can be impossible. The web has changed that a bit — there’s a website called Kickstarter that is “a funding platform for artists, designers, filmmakers, musicians, journalists, inventors, explorers…” It aims to match artists with small ($5-$50) donors. The donors get something for their donation — maybe a copy of the book or CD produced, an invitation to a party…
Sam Winston’s project is to turn his artist’s book into a trade edition. If you go here, there’s a video about this book (pictured below, and he says about the book “Initially Dictionary Story started as a short narrative in which certain words from the dictionary became living characters that met each other…”). On his blog he has more pictures of the book and the poster he made from it. You can see other projects looking for funding here.

While I’ve written about Brian Dettmer’s altered books in the past, I’ve only seen pictures of his work. That is until today, when I paid a visit to the Toomey Tourell gallery in San Francisco. There’s nearly 2 dozen pieces on display, all picture books (mostly encyclopedias) that have been carved up and layered, producing an almost kaleidoscopic effect. And they aren’t just single books, several are like the one to the left — conjoined to make a much more interesting sculpture. The exhibit runs through the end of September.