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The history of artists’ books is inseparable from the history of the book. Before books took the form they do today; a series of folded pages secured together at one edge, other forms existed including the use of clay or stone tablets, parchment scrolls or in Asia thin bamboo or pandanus strips made into a series of slats ‘strung’ together like a Venetian blind or fixed at a point to form a fan.

Each new technological development enabled new methods of book making; the invention of paper allowed folds to be made in the material to form a folded concertina.

Although the history of books is a long one Johanna Drucker the author of The century of artists' books situates artists’ books as an artistic practice that originated in the last 100 years.

The illuminated manuscripts of medieval times are certainly works of art but they do not fall into the zone of the artists’ book, many more contemporary illustrated books may contain works of art but also do not fit into the context of the artists’ book.

Drucker defines an artist book as one that ‘interrogates the form of the book’ and 'conceptually engages with what a book is and could be’. (Drucker, J 2004)

Two artists cited as precursors to this practice are William Blake and William Morris; Blake was a poet and visionary artist and produced his own illustrated books of poems and William Morris was the leader of the arts and crafts movement, a response to industrial processes.

Livre d’artiste are considered by many to be the precursors to contemporary artists’ book however interestingly Drucker does not include livre d’artiste in her considerations of what constitutes an artists’ book.

 Livre d’artiste were books created by artists such as Picasso Matisse Miro and Duchamp combining visual works in conjunction with poetry which enabled them to create works that did not necessarily fit in with their oeuvre and or to create works for the printed medium.

The history of livre d’artiste stems from the mid to late 19^th century encouraged by the Parisian art dealer Ambroise Vollard in publishing ventures to take advantage of the increased demand for art and luxury items due to the industrial revolution. Books produced by these artists focused on printing as an art form not as a means of mass production and were generally limited edition signed by the artist.

In a statement in the introduction to Australian Artists Books Alex Selenitsch provides a definition for an art that takes a variety of formats including pages in folders or boxes, scrolls and folded concertinas.

“An artists' book is a book made by an artist, and is meant to be an art work.”  Alex Selenitsch

Artists who create artists’ books draw on this rich history of the book to inform their practice and the results are works that manifest in a variety of forms or are hybrids of one or more of these historical techniques. Consequently there are no set parameters of what constitutes an artists’ book or for what to call them.

There are a number of terms that are used to refer to the same basic concept including book art, bookworks, book as artwork, artists' book objects, bookwork, artists books (with no apostrophe).

The look and feel of books as we know them… a series of folded sheets joined together at the folded edge to create a series of pages that can be leafed through provides a versatile means for an artist to present their ideas. It allows the viewer to hold the work close to themselves, to move backwards and forwards from one work to another allowing the work to be ‘read’ in a different ways.

Jonathan Safran Foers book Tree of Codes is a fascinating book that I think fits into the genre of artists’ books; the experience of reading it involves an engagement which is quite different from reading other books.

The pages in this book have been die cut so each page reveals the layers beneath it; some of these are the next page other cut sections are deeper.  His intention was to create new book by erasing or cutting away some of the text from an existing work. He used the existing text from The Street of Crocodiles by Bruno Schulz as the starting point as this was his favourite book and creates a completely new narrative and also a work that is sculptural and poetic.  Although there is a narrative it can also be read as a concrete poem.

Artists’ books are now featured in the collections of major state and university libraries many of which have wonderful online galleries. The State Library of Queensland’s resource:  Artists’ books – redefining the book arranges the on line collection with the following categories – Altered books: Books that look like other objects, Binding – intricate folds, Binding – concertina,   Collaborations between artists and nature, Found object, Materials other than paper and sculptural.

These categories demonstrate the range of approaches and each of these approaches focuses on one or more aspects of the book:  printing, typography, text, image, paper, construction technique eg. folding, binding etc.  and the sculptural possibilities etc.

The State Library of Queensland  online collection and exhibition of artists’ books provides examples of different styles of artists’ books including the book as object, concertina style, altered books etc. Books that look like other objects as the name suggests are books that have been made to look like something other than a book.  In the online collection at the State Library of Queensland books in this category include a book in the shape of a tennis ball, a ham and lettuce sandwich a bag of liquorice allsorts.

Out of interest follow this link to a catalogue entry of an Artists' Book.

The State Library of Victoria which currently has a permanent exhibition on the history of books that includes some artists’ books and also an exhibition called Fine Impressions: Printmaking and Artists’ books in Melbourne 1999-2010 which focuses on 20 contemporary Australian artists working in this area.  The exhibition runs until 16^th of February 2012. The exhibition at the state library focuses on the work of 20 Australian artists it not an exhaustive exhibition but provides an insight into contemporary practice in this area.

Concertina folds

The majority of the books take on a conventional book form and explored the relationships between text and image. Only a couple of the works explored other forms, one entitled Envelope was a foolscap envelope sized archival folder containing separate sheets and the other a small concertina style folded ‘book’.  The works include collaborations between artists and writers and employ printing in a variety of ways.  

A recent show by Melbourne artist Penny Peckham explores a variety of themes through text and image in one off and limited edition hand printed books.  Penny uses hand cut stamps with linocut printing some of her works extend to scroll like ‘wallpaper’ strips. The piece I enjoyed the most is a small hand stitched book which contains on its pages the last sentences of 20 classic books.

Nicholoas Jones is a Melbourne artist well known for his altered books. I have seen some of his works at Craft Victoria his website has a wonderful online gallery with examples of his work which extends from books that have been carved, incised and folded to installations of works.

Altered book

There are frequently exhibitions around Melbourne that feature artists books;  Artisan books bookshop in Gertrude Street Fitzroy has hosted exhibitions of artists’ books since 2006 around broad themes such as Red/Read and Text/txt the works are diverse and beautiful and  the archives are available online and there will be an exhibition of sculptural and artists’ books at 69 Smith Street Gallery  in Collingwood by  Marianne Little from October 19 to November 6 .

There are also numerous authoritative sites on the WWW that I recommend visiting that focus on different aspects of  artists' books The BoneFolder a site hosted by the University of Syracuse in the USA. This site has lots of links and information regarding bookworks, book binding, etc. and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London has a wonderful online resource and gallery of artists. Books and  the blog The bitter sweet  art of cutting up books  has some wonderful images of altered books and books art if you are prepared to disregard the advertisements.

Sarah Bodman  a UK artist and Senior Research Fellow for Artists’ Books at the Centre for Fine Print Research at the University of the West of England recently conducted a Q and A for the State Library of Victoria to coincide with their current exhibition of artists’ books.

Follow this link to view a short video of her work. 

An article in the Age recently focused on the artist David Hockney and his use of the IPad as a new tool for making art.  When fax technology first came about Hockney created works and sent them to his friends via fax now he is using his IPad as a sketch pad and emails the results to his friends.

The artist explained how he sketched an image and then zoomed out to make the ‘canvas’ larger and then drew an easel around the first image he zoomed out again and drew a room around the easel and explained that this capacity to zoom out was unlimited.

This poses the question what does the future hold? The advent of sound and moving image in e-books suggests all sorts of possibilities for artists. Will artists increasingly use digital technology to make artists books and if they do, will they be books or just websites?

The advent of new technology also encourages a return to craft with a focus on materials and a homemade aesthetic at one end of the spectrum with hand made cheaply photocopied and roughly hand cut collaged text and image seen in zines, to a more sophisticated craft based works focusing on paper making book binding and printing techniques, to the sculptural works of local artists such as with Nicholas johns who ‘alters’ books by cutting and folding.

If you interested in zines and haven’t been to Sticky yet try to get there soon as they may not be around much longer as there funding is currently in jeopardy. Sticky is a shopfront in Campbell arcade which is situated in the subway running between Degraves Street and flinders street station it can be found by descending the stairs on the city side of Flinders Street opposite the station between Swanston and Elizabeth Street.

Sticky sells zines of all shapes and sizes most are limited editions using photocopying or digital copying or printing as a means of production, some are drawn, others collaged and some of my favourites are tiny ‘books’ pictorial ‘books’ using old stamps.

Over the past hundred years those artists’ books have been made artists have responded to new technology either by resisting or embracing it. Each approach has brought with it innovations and new possibilities.   William Morris' decision  to resist mass production and embrace craft based approaches to printing and book making resulted in beautiful and enduring works whereas David Hockney’s impulse to exploit and embrace new technology as a tool for making his art results in innovations and the opening up of new possibilities. 

Based on the explorations of artists like Hockney with IPhones and IPads and the increased popularity of e-books and other digital devises I would suggest that the future for artists books is rich with possibilities and will undoubtedly include a full range of creations from the high end craft based artist book, to the more hand made cheaply produced zine to animated e-books. 

References

Artist Books 2010 "Atlas - an exhibition of artist books", Artisan Books, viewed 14 September 2011, <http://www.artisan.com.au/exhibition/artist_book10.htm >.

Artist Books 2007 "Text/txt" - an exhibition of artist books, Artisan Books, viewed 14 September 2011, < http://www.artisan.com.au/exhibition/artist_book07.htm>.  

Artists’ books – a Q and A with Sarah Bodman 2011, State Library of Victoria,<http://news.blogs.slv.vic.gov.au/2011/09/26/artists-books-a-q-and-a-with-sarah-bodman/ >.

Artists books, Victoria and Albert Museum, viewed 14September 2011, <http://www.vam.ac.uk/page/a/artists-books/ >.
Artists’ Books 2011, State Library of Victoria, viewed 16 September 2011, <http://www.slv.vic.gov.au/our-collections/collection-strengths/history-book/artists-books>.
Artists’ books – redefining the book 2011, State Library of Queensland, viewed 21 August 2011,
< http://www.slq.qld.gov.au/find/online/ab/find_artists_books>. 

Barchfield, J  2010, Forget the canvas: British artist draws on iPad instead, The Age, viewed October 9 2011, <http://www.theage.com.au/digital-life/ipad/forget-the-canvas-british-artist-draws-on-ipad-instead-20101019-16rgp.html#ixzz1bq8kG0EE>.

Bodman S & Sowden T 2011, Cherry Blossom Island Tree, University of West England, viewed October 23 2011, < http://www.bookarts.uwe.ac.uk/cherry1.htm>. 

Drucker, J c2004 The century of artists' books, 2nd edn, Granary, New York.

The William Blake Archive , viewed October 23 2011, <http://www.blakearchive.org/blake/ >.

Gayford, M 2011, David Hockney's iPad art, The Telegraph, viewed on October 10 2011, <http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/art/art-features/8066839/David-Hockneys-iPad-art.html >.

Index 2011, Sticky Institute, viewed 21 September 2011, <http://www.stickyinstitute.com/>.

Johnson, RF & Stein, D 2002, Artists books in the modern era 1870-2000: the Reva and David Logan collection of illustrated books, Thames & Hudson, London. 

 Nicholas Jones book sculptor 2011, Bibliopath, viewed October 15 2011, <http://www.bibliopath.org/>.

Safran Foer, J. 2011, Tree of Codes, Visual Editions, London.

Sarah Bodman, Zybooks; artists’ books online, viewed October 17 2011, <http://www.zyarts.com/zybooks/sarah.html >. Selenitsch, A 2008, Australian artists books, National Gallery of Australia, Parkes, A.C.T. 

 The bittersweet art of cutting up books 2011, Dark roasted blend, viewed October 17 2011, <http://www.darkroastedblend.com/2008/09/bittersweet-art-of-cutting-up-books.htm>. 

 The directory of artists' book collections 2010, viewed on October 20 2011, <http://www.andrew.cmu.edu/user/md2z/ArtistsBooksDirectory/ArtistsBookIndex.htm>.

V&A Artists’ books 2011, Victoria and Albert Museum, viewed 20 September  2011, <http://www.vam.ac.uk/page/a/artists-books/ >.

 Verheyen, P D (ed.) 2011, The BoneFolder – an e-journal for the bookbinder and book artist, DOAJ Directory of Open Access Journals, viewed 21 August 2011, <http://www.philobiblon.com/bonefolder/>.