Books: Sculptural Art

‘Book of the Dead’

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Book sculpture.

This large book draws inspiration from the Mexican Day of the Dead. It features two ‘pages’ separated by a leather leaf. The covers are soft leather with a Sun made of melted tin on the front. The symbology and visual narrative of this book tell a story without words. This is a seminal piece among my artist books – it is the second artist book I ever made. First exhibited in Finland in 1993, it was met largely with some incomprehension. In the years to come, it has been noted in various contexts several times, also being featured in the Dutch publication ‘Het leven van texten’ by Kiene Brillenburgh Wurth & Ann Rigney (Amsterdam University Press, 2006) In many ways, at the time of creating this piece, I was not yet encumbered by such learnings in the field of book arts that was, in hindsight, very liberating. At the same time I feel this work still to be very contemporary, I could see myself making the same piece still now, years later.

This book was destroyed by fire in 2009