First Edition of Ulysses by James Joyce. Published by Shakespeare and Company in 1922The beginning of Ulysses as it appeared on Twitter June, 16, 2011. In honor of Bloomsday, the novel is being tweeted in 140 character increments @11yssesThis is not the first time the paths of Twitter and Ulysses crossed. In 2007, before Twitter was a household name, the folks at Booktwo.org tweeted the entire novel. It took 257 days! See more at our piece from Dec. '07, The Twitter Edition of James Joyce's Ulysses. Leopold Bloom The portrait of Leopold Bloom above is from Ulysses "Seen". A new...
The Biblio Universe of Adam Bateman
In Adam Bateman's world books are the structural foundation. Whether he is building walls, spheres or stacks the book is his cornerstone. Adam Bateman, The Fourth Thousand Years, books, 2011In the Artist Statement from one of his past shows, Bateman says:"The primary structure of my sculptures is the text of the books, the secondary structure is the form made of books. In that way, the books actually work as signifiers (like words) and so the structured arrangement I make with them is analogous to writing."Drawing heavily from the Minimalists Bateman believes in "art as language" and luckily for us books are...
Book Art on Parade in Iowa City
Chicago had its Cows on Parade, Seattle had its Pigs on Parade now Iowa City will soon unveil Book Art on Parade.To celebrate it being named by UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization) as the third City of Literature in the world, and the only one in the United States, in 2008, Johnson County, Iowa created Book Marks.Book Marks is a public art project that will feature over 60 book-themed statues, each 5-feet by 3 1/2-feet, that will be displayed throughout the county from June through October. As with similar "parades" each sculpture has a sponsor and after...
The Beauty of Folded Corners: "Dog Ear" by Erica Baum
For the book collector a dog-ear has a nasty bite, its presence as Kenneth Goldsmith points out in his introductory essay "even when smoothed out and returned to its upright position, scars the page forever."But for Erica Baum the dog-ear opens up new possibilities for engaging with the text. For the Dog Ear series Baum carefully dog-eared pages of mass market paperbacks and then photographed them. The diagonal line becomes not only the chosen method of saving one's place but also the jumping off point. The line begets new lines and ultimately new meaning. Published by Ugly Duckling Presse Dog...
Words as Spiritual Armor: The Art of Lesley Dill
Word Messengers (A Single Screw of Flesh is All That Pins the Soul), 2006, organza, ribbon, silk, glueThe current exhibit at The Columbia Museum of Art features the work of the contemporary American artist Lesley Dill.The show, I Heard a Voice: The Art of Lesley Dill, consists of 34 pieces and is "the first retrospective exhibition of the artist of this scale."A Word Made Flesh...Throat, 1994, photolithograph, mixed intaglio, thread, with text by Emily DickinsonFrom the press release:Her pieces give visual form to poetic texts by Emily Dickinson, Salvador Espriu, Franz Kafka and others. For Dill, words are her ‘spiritual armor’ and she freely...