Summer Reading

Summer Reading is an exhibition catalogue published to accompany the exhibition of the same name at Center for Book Arts in 2021. This catalogue includes an introduction by Corina Reynolds, essay by Ann Tarantino & Lindsey Landfried,  documentation of all the works in the exhibition, and a reading list collected by the artists in the exhibition. Artists include Breanne Trammell, Cassie Tompkins, Colette Fu, Dan Walsh, Diane Samuels, Erik den Breejen, Jill Moser with Charles Bernstein & Major Jackson, Joy Drury Cox, Lenka Clayton, Lesley Dill, Mary Ellen Bartley, Meg Hitchcock, Michael Mandiberg, Shanti Grumbine, Skye Gilkerson, Tauba Auerbach (Diagonal Press), Travis Head, and Ward Shelley.

In the high season of leisure reading and scholastic book challenges, Center for Book Arts presents Summer Reading, an exhibition of works by contemporary artists who take creative approaches to the book, text, and language. In this exhibition, the book is simultaneously complemented and subverted. Artists investigate the tradition of artist’s books as artistic structure, storytelling in visual art, the narrative possibilities of language, and the object-ness of book material in circulation. Including prints, sculptures, and works on paper that explore the design and aesthetics of language, this exhibition celebrates the relationship between reading and making. Summer Reading extends beyond the gallery walls to include featured reading lists culled by the artist participants and associated lending lists for all ages, developed with our local partner libraries.

Catalog design by Ben Denzer.

Screen printing by Melissa Guido.

Bound by Sarah Smith.