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A Place for the Artist/Writer
One of the potentials I have most cherished in the artist's book is that it makes a place for the artist/writer. In the history of Western book production, with its specialization of functions, the artist and the writer were usually different people, and in the divided psyche of our culture, the visual and the verbal are too often split off from each other. For centuries, the artist who was also a writer and bookmaker, like William Blake, or the writer whose books included his art, like Kenneth Patchen, were freakish anomalies. Those who wanted to do both were more or less confined to children's books or comic books. In our time, within the newer understandings and permissions of the artist's book, dozens of artist/writers have developed individual ways of integrating their writing and their artmaking. Let's not underestimate what a cultural innovation this is, and what a rare time of opportunity.
—Betsy Davids
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