Artists' Books, or Book Works as they are also referred to, are part of most artists' vocabulary, either as drawings bound together, illustrated diaries or a response to a place, time, political or historical event, or personal emotion.
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Avril Makula and Liz Jeneid, the curators of the PLACE exhibition, are both involved in the making of books. Avril is a book designer and maker of unique books who explores the book as art using typography, geometry and colour as content. Liz is a printmaker who has experimented with different approaches, combining various techniques in the bookmaking process. Liz also pioneered a bookmaking course at UOW Faculty of Creative Arts.
PLACE brings together 38 book artists from NSW, ACT, Victoria and Queensland. The books vary in size, content and technique, and form an extraordinary collection of books that is intended to delight and intrigue the viewer. The works in this exhibition vary in technique, content and materials used, so it offers many different experiences for viewers, from children to adults, drawers to printmakers, artists who love making constructed works and the general public. Words too in the books seduce us with their placement, relationship to content, and introduction to the use of text as image.
Some works use only image to talk about PLACE, while others combine text and image. The genre of Bookworks or Artists' Books provides artists with a wonderful opportunity for them to use any kind of materials to talk about their chosen subject. Intimate, even painful, events in their lives are used as subject matter, and there are also artists who use books as a way of reacting to political situations, from the personal to the public.
Viewers will be stimulated by these many approaches to the use of material, such as Kathryn Orton's large wooden book, Pictures from The End, housed in an old found wooden box. Jackie Cavallaro and Lucia Parrella's use of finely detailed cut outs attract the viewer's attention. Sue Anderson and Gwen Harrison's combination of letterpress and beautifully executed bold prints is a wonderful example of how two artists can work together to produce an outstanding piece.
Scale is another interesting example of how artists have interpreted the brief. From a tiny book by Gary Smith using railway tickets to Monica Oppen's work that, when opened, can cover a large table.
This is an exhibition that will intrigue and may even stimulate viewers to make a book of their own which responds to a time or place in their lives. The PLACE exhibition will be displayed at the Grenfell Art Gallery from Tuesday, 30 July 2019 - Sunday, 8 September 2019
