Books of the Heart

The Crouch Fine Arts Library at Baylor University in Texas is commemorating Valentine’s Day with an online exhibition of materials celebrating the heart from their special collections. Two that struck me immediately were Kumi Korf’s Hole in my Heart, pictured below. It’s a octagon structure containing 4 books, and “by folding and twisting the octagon, multiple symbolic structures can be created. The hidden books contain poems by four Japanese court women who used poetry to fill the holes in their hearts.”
The other is called r & j: the txt msg edition — the author says “I asked my 16-year-old granddaughter to rewrite the balcony scene from Romeo and Juliet as if it had all happened between two teens text messaging on their cell phones.” An example:

J: y do y have 2 b romeo? if u change ur name & promise u luv me ill change mine

Hole in my Heart by Kumi Korf

2 thoughts on “Books of the Heart”

  1. I spotted the same exhibition and also wrote a post about it, to be published next week! I liked the text message book as an prompt for students; I also thought Ron King’s book could inspire some book-altering projects.

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