Curated by Maria G. Pisano
Book as Witness: The Artist’s Response presents artists who are continuing the tradition of creating book works as keepers of our collective memory. They use the book format, in its myriad transformative powers, to express their interpretive and personal memory stories. Presented are the works of artists who use the book form to create pieces dealing with death and destruction as a result of global conflicts, prejudice, terrorism, natural disasters, and individual losses. These books are powerful mementos, and even as they focus on death, they commemorate life. The artists assemble objects, memories and realities, and embody them in a tactile form that resonates with their journey to find meaning in personal or communal losses. The books speak of time, memory and history. As memories accumulate they are selected, organized and stored within; accessing these visual echoes and finding these markers, they surface as art objects.
Artists
Laurie Alpert, Anonymous Veteran, Booklyn Artists Alliance (Marshall Weber with MT Karthik, Sara Parkel, Garret Repenhagen, Felice Tebbe, Mark Wagner, Stacey Wakefield, Isabelle Weber, Christopher Wilde, et al.), Paola Cannatella with Giuseppe Galeani, Joydeb and Moyna Chitrakar, Ernie Colon with Sid Jacobson, Combat Papermakers (Jesse Albrecht, Chris Arendt, Drew Cameron, John La Falce, Margaret Mahan, Drew Luan Matott, Kevin Matott, and James O’Neil), Maureen Cummins, Adam Cvijanovic with Jewel Grutman & Gay Matthaei, Mindell Dubansky, Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) Warrior Writers Project (Lovella Calica-Editor, Drew Cameron, Toby Hartbarger, Sholon Keller, Aaron Hughes, Justin Cliburn, Mark Wilkerson, Eli Writh, Fernando & Maria Braga, Jon Turner, Phil Aliff, Cloy Richard, Matt Howard, Vince Emanuele, Mike Blake, Paul Abernathy, Mark Lachance, Garet Reppenhagen, Sara Wallace, Nathan Lewis, Hart Viges, Jared Hood, and Jeff Key), Jacques Fournier with Edward Hillel, David Gothard, Fred Hagstrom, Caren Heft, Jahje Bath Ives, Shellie Jacobson, David Keefe, Peter Rutledge Koch with Debra Magpie Earling, Michael Kuch, Nathan Lewis, Miranda Maher, Helen Malone, Craig Matis, Drew Matott and Jason Stalling, Jeffrey Morin, Keiji Nakazawa, Monica Oppen, Robbin Ami Silverberg, Claire Simon, Art Spiegelman, Scott Teplin with Joel Brouwer, Michelle Wilson, and Dorothy A. Yule.
Support for Center for Book Arts’ visual arts programming is provided, in part, by the New York State Council on the Arts, with the support of the New York State Legislature, and by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.
