Bookmarks IX: Infiltrating the Library System

by

Laine Farley

It’s time again to celebrate the extraordinary display of talent expressed in the exhibit known as Bookmarks IX: Infiltrating the Library System, sponsored by the Centre for Fine Print Research at the University of the West of England, Bristol, UK. Begun nine years ago as a way to promote artists’ books, it has become a very popular event with artists, librarians, book lovers, and of course bookmark collectors. Brief background and links to all previous exhibits are listed here.

Last year, Lauren wrote about Bookmarks VIII and BiblioBuffet’s debut as an online distribution venue. I have written about Bookmarks V and artist Mary V. Marsh from Bookmarks VI. I first discovered the exhibit with Bookmarks IV and wrote about themes from it and the first three exhibits. I thought it would be fun to re-examine those themes and see if they were still in evidence or whether new themes have emerged over time.

A couple of weeks ago, I received a packet of randomly selected bookmarks from Lauren as part of the distribution package for BiblioBuffet. I quickly jotted down some initial impressions and then eagerly awaited the official launch so that I could see others posted on the Bookmarks IX web site. They fell loosely into two categories: those that are art works on a small canvas and those that are related to books and wayfinding, the job of bookmarks.

Art on a small canvas: The challenge of applying a familiar technique to a new format continues to appeal to many artists. Regi Mueller produced a lovely set of yellow-toned images with serigraphy called “Silhouettes.” The undulating lines connect across bookmarks, presumably in sets of five. Friederun Hardt-Friederichs contributed a stunning set of abstract images using a technique I can’t identify. Blocks of color in yellow, blue, orange and metallic gold are laid in textured paper, attached to bright yellow cards. “One Hundred Tea Pots” is a gorgeous example of “ink gardening” by Ania Gilmore where she applied Japanese Sumi-e black ink to dried tea bags.

Laura Gunnip and Robin Doggett collaborate to produce artists’ books, prints and installations. They commemorated the Bookmarks exhibit with a first printing on a new style Chandler & Price Letterpress from 1911, creating an image of letters and symbols. Founder of Fiber Arts Sedona, artist Dee Durkee, created bookmarks to promote the organization of artists working in fiber arts in Arizona. She explains that the bookmarks are “printed on acid-free paper, dyed with bleeding tissues, enhanced with splashes of acrylic paints and dyes, with miscellaneous fibers tied to one end.” Melanie Cory brings her medium directly to bookmarks by photographing cameras and light meters, and printing the images to represent or demonstrate various photographic processes.

Artists Perera, Grainger, and McKeown derive their bookmarks from their other art works, but the subject matter relates more directly to common themes described below.

Constructions: I am always astonished at the work some artists put into constructing bookmarks. This year, L J Douglas stands out with her touching mini-artist’s book that documents life in Illinois with a photograph of an early settler, Christiana Tilson, along with a page from her diary in 1820. The tiniest braid attaches these to a page displaying a child’s drawing of a farm. “Unfolding Architectural Books” by Charlotte Hall effectively uses vertical images of buildings on sewn-together pages to emphasize the bookmark format. I was not able to examine in person Martha Lea’s creation entitled “One Hundred Hidden Haiku,” but it sounds intriguing. According to her description, “Each sealed envelope bookmark contains an interpretation of a haiku about rain, mulberry leaves and silkworms by Matsuo Basho (1644-94).” Each one is different, using the themes of rain, mulberries and silkworms, all contained in a perfect little packet. I like the idea of using haiku on bookmarks as a concession to the small space, but also as a way to give the haiku center stage. Tony Griffin, described below, has also created a clever construction for his book-themed bookmark.

Somewhat related to constructions are individual bookmarks on a theme, this year represented by Leslie Wilson-Rutterford in her “100 Years” series. She wanted to document “human beings at each stage in life, at each age. 100 Years is a collection of people at each age from 1 to 100.” Her blog documents her quest for the images and the emotional journey and observations on what she learned in researching anonymous images. She faded the images to make them less recognizable. The example I have is #1, a smiling blurry baby.

The next example blends the idea of individual bookmarks on a theme with an interactive challenge. In her quest to raise the status of the everyday through illustration, Mary Pullen has created sets of ten bookmarks with a hand drawn and colored, digitally printed illustration called ‘Bookshelf’. She asks that those who receive one of her bookmarks visit her Facebook page to “create a mini community there where ‘Bookshelf’ bookmark holders meet and the ten complete images come together once again.” In years past, there were more examples of interactive bookmark themes.

Books: By far the largest category this year is book related. From the actual to the abstract, books have inspired almost half of the artists. Vivid photographs of books in his collection make Todd Zimmer’s bookmarks appealing, but his account of what it took to make the photos is a delight. Serse Luigetti also invokes book covers and what appear to be publishers’ advertisements, although he provides no explanation. In a screen-printed drawing, Kitty Reford blends images from her own bookshelf with characters she has observed in conversation in libraries and cafes.  What is most impressive about her work is that she supplies a bibliography (complete with ISBNs) for the books on the shelf.

In “Collecting Stories, Creating Memories,” Martina Edmondson continues the idea of books and conversation by featuring words and faces of “women [who] get together to discuss books and how stories read relate to their own experiences; inevitably gaining a better understanding through reading, listening, learning and communicating.” On the reverse is an intriguing image of a hollowed out book with “book bracelets” inside, one of her works titled “Book Bracelets in Situ.”

Glynis Porter crafted a lovely bookmark with an embossed door (which doesn’t show in the image but is quite detailed) next to text from The Mill on The Floss by George Eliot,  “a book concerned with the effect of knowledge: bookish versus practical.” She also comments on the “ability of books to open doors to the unknown” as part of her inspiration. Another pleasing bookmark comes from Brooke Koven who blends the idea of endpapers with a bookplate, making a practical bookmark that can be personalized.

Tony Griffin combines a library checkout card, a strip of text from the book and a strip painted to look like a shard of china in a small envelope. He explains that he inherited a set of china teacups from his mother: “They are in perfect condition and seem to possess some of that preciousness that had drawn my mother to them in the first place. At the same time, in my garden, I found many shards of highly decorated Victorian pottery. I was struck by their lack of preciousness and the manner in which the years had stripped away their value as our connections with their owners was lost.” Regardless of conclusions you may draw about the relationship to the representations of books, this little packet is strangely intimate and affecting.

In “The Archivist’s Tower,” Jill McKeown illustrates a three-dimensional piece she constructed out of artists’ books, altered books and text to form a tower in a suitcase with text in the background. It’s a little difficult to see the detail, but it must be impressive to see the actual object.  A more detailed description and photos are located here.

The book has been deconstructed and now becomes more abstract in a bookmark by Jonathan James with a wisp of text on a watery blue background. “Curled Pages” with its intricate curls and almost sepia tone by Emma Parker was inspired by old books on library shelves. “Glossa Interlinearis” by Sumi Perera encourages us to “read between the lines, and reflect on issues of unconscious plagiarism and appropriation.” Blank spaces are left within the bookmarks for the reader to annotate, although the embossed texture would probably make that impractical. Meg Green’s “Some Odd Pages” creates a vertical image suggestive of trees or even cathedrals. She explains that the design reflects her interest in “naturalized spaces, fluidity of language, text and image, and the practice of asemic [i.e., having no specific semantic content] writing as an extension of direct experience.”

Frances Kiernan explains that threads and string with their themes of connection are common in her work. She used a screen-printed image of tangled strands of silk and relates them to books in her work called “Threads”: “The threads of a story weave their tangled way through a book from beginning to end.” With images of patterns and sewing, Linda Hasking’s bookmark declares, “Don’t Lose the Thread.” She observes that the words “paper, stitch, crease, thread, words, cloth, binding” are common to books and to needlework and that “Not losing the thread; as important when reading as it is when bookbinding and dressmaking.”

Wayfinding: The metaphor of threads also relates to another common theme of marking and finding a path. Arrows, pointing fingers, and of course maps have been used by artists to convey this idea in past exhibits and this year is no exception. Ulrike Siebe places a large pink “You are here” dot on strips from maps, observing that reading a book is like going on a journey. Hanne Matthiesen takes the idea a step further, creating tiny (but lengthy—meaning long?) artists’ book out of old school maps to create mini atlases with “ philosophical/existential questions or statements that examine the common denominator between exploring a new country/territory—and reading a book” such as “towards new horizons” and “ you are here.” They have carefully sewn strips of cloth at the top with translucent covers, and bright orange dots. Aidan Moesby creates a different kind of pointer on a letterpress design of dotted lines, arrows, and circles with markers of A, B, C, D, E to create a maze-like effect that is structured but disorienting at the same time. Hazel Grainger bases her “Delayed” design on “the visual ephemera and language of travel, inspired by a collection of discarded 1960s train tickets and experiences as a rail commuter.” Sometimes finding one’s way in a book or on a train is just that—delayed. Hazel uses ephemera in her work, especially related to travel, and has even made train-themed bookmarks. (See her blog for examples.)

One category from the past that received no attention this year other than Hazel’s slight nod is what I call “Found”—using items that are left behind such as tickets or cards to create bookmarks. I suppose there is no particular significance but I noted that at least five artists used this theme when I first wrote about the exhibit.

On the other hand the category of social commentary was little used before but has at least four examples in Bookmarks IX. Maureen Piggins based her bookmark on her 2009 artist book entitled “Echo” which portrayed her mother's death from breast cancer with photograph, image and text. A collage of newspaper reports of natural disasters, demonstrations and violence form bookmarks from Sara Elgerot. She used these themes in an artist book/zine called “The Revolution Will Be Televised / Nature Can't Be Tamed” with the title being  a play on Gil Scott-Heron's “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised,” “which for our time is  perhaps the complete opposite.” In “Aliens,” Pauline Lamont-Fisher was also disturbed by changes in the environment saying that her image of ghostly mounds was “Observed while walking in the driest spring for 100 years and after visiting Susan Hiller’s recent exhibition.” Hiller is known for her explorations of “what happens after” and her work, which explored the world of UFOs in a recent exhibition at the Tate Gallery, has been described as “very, very frightening, but you feel that Hiller is scared by it as well.” The last example by Anonymous also relates to an exhibit at the Tate by controversial artist Ai Weiwei. Shortly after Anonymous visited the exhibit it was shut down, not for political reasons, but because the 100 million porcelain sunflower seeds were giving off noxious ceramic dust. Anonymous observed, “How fortunate we are to be able to express ourselves freely and read what we like.”

Humor and Fun: Natalia Crespo leads off the final category with her bold, bright designs depicting “little things in daily life that make us happy” such as good food, friends, sunsets, and messages! These bookmarks have a great feel, sort of a satiny plastic that you know will make a good bookmark. Mysterious yet comical, Barbara Crawford’s bookmarks with googly eyes immediately draw attention. She provides no explanation but they appear to be made with random mechanical parts and printed on pink or blue background (a clue to gender?). Nick Silva’s “Quiet Please!” bookmark with bold red lips pokes fun at the library sign and “subvert[s] the origin of the word and written stories which were originally passed on from person to person by way of the Spoken Word.” And last but not least is Debbie Hill’s very funny want ads “especially focused around the debate of ‘ridding the world’ of ‘real’ books and replacing them with technology based products such as iPads etc.”  Don’t be fooled by its modest appearance—read carefully the ad that begins “If you love haiku and getting caught in a book . . . ”

I asked Sarah Bodman, curator of the exhibit, whether any themes seem to occur every year. After commenting that she is always amazed by the endless variety of materials used, such as paper clay sculptures, hand sewn textiles, photocopy, old envelopes, old library cards, she commented, “Themes that emerge each time are often (naturally) literary or library inspired, often about the act of reading and of slipping artworks into a space where others may not expect to find them.” This year’s entries were especially characteristic of book and art related themes. I also asked Sarah which examples she thought work especially well as bookmarks. She cited from this year Kitty Reford’s drawings of bookshelves that “might inspire readers to consider the books they are reading.” As for those that work well as artforms, she called out Tony Griffin’s multipart decorative pottery inspired bookmarks and Hanne Matthiesen’s ‘where you are’ travel bookmarks.

No matter what your taste or favorite theme, there is a wonderful artist-produced bookmark that will make you smile, gasp, think or simply enjoy. If you would like one or more of the bookmarks mentioned above, send BiblioBuffet an email, telling us which ones (by artist name) that you would like in order of preference. We will mail them free of charge to you so be sure to enclose your mailing address too. (We will not use your address for anything other than mailing these bookmarks.) While neither Bookmarks IX nor BiblioBuffet can guarantee that you will receive your first choices or all that you may want, we will accommodate you as best as we can.

To choose the ones you would like to receive, please click here to see the gallery in alphabetical order by artist  (you can enlarge each image by clicking on it) or click the artists’ names (above) to see the individual bookmarks.

Laine Farley is a digital librarian who misses being around the look, feel and smell of real books.  Her collection of over 3,000 bookmarks began with a serendipitous find while reviewing books donated to the library. Fortunately, her complementary collection of articles and books about bookmarks provides an excuse for her to get back to libraries and try her hand at writing about bookmarks. Contact Laine.