Artists' Books in Crossett: A-B

And Yet My Mask is Powerful emerges from an exhibition by multimedia artists Basel Abbas and Ruanne Abou-Rahme, held at Carroll / Fletcher in London in 2016. Carrying on from their earlier project The Incidental Insurgents (2012-2015), the artists address the apocalyptic logic of perpetual crisis that characterizes the contemporary moment. The project takes its title from Adrienne Rich's poem "Diving Into the Wreck," and like that of the poem, its mise-en-scène is a field of wreckage. Here, the artists visit destroyed villages in occupied Palestine, documenting groups of Palestinian youths wearing copies of Neolithic masks. These masks, some of the oldest in the world, were originally found in the West Bank and are now stored in private Israeli collections; they have been copied and 3D-printed by the artists from online exhibition photographs. The book uses computer screenshots of images framed in software windows, layering them across the pages along with scans and typographic interventions. The work suggests a sense of collapse and return, but one oriented toward futurity, reworking the Arab world's apocalyptic imaginary into another, parallel, unrealized time. 184 p. 24 x 20.5 cm. Offset Printed. Edition of 1,000.

With 12 prints by Joan Abelson. One thousand copies of this book designed and printed by George Hitchcock at the Kayak Press.

Edition of 40. A fine press book of a poem by artist/printer . The poem is split into ten parts and adjacent to each is a constellation printed in red. 6 x 9"; 28 pages. Printed from polymer plates prepared by Boxcar Press on Vandercook Universal III Flat Bed Press. Type set in Garamond. Printed on Somerset Book papers. Pamphlet stitch binding. Erika Adams, assisted by Margot Ecke, printed and bound the edition of 40 books at Smokey Road Press.

Images originally drawn in India ink and printed in various shades of green. Printed from polymer plates prepared by Boxcar Press on a Vandercook Universal III Flat Bed Press. Type set in Garamond. Printed on Somerset Book paper. Pamphlet stitch binding. Erika Adams, assisted by Margot Ecke, printed and bound the edition of 100 numbered books at Smokey Road Press.

Matthew Adis’ The Threshold of Atrocity is a raw and visceral collection of drawings, reproduced in brutal black and white. Grotesque contortions of insects overlay stark silhouettes, creating twisted portraits that resemble human faces made up of moths, worms, and other creatures. 12 unnumbered p.; 28 x 22 cm.; Staple Bound

In the spring of 2007, Doug Aitken: Sleepwalkers premiered as a monumental outdoor video projection onto seven facades of the Museum of Modern Art in midtown Manhattan. The silent story, told with exquisite imagery, chronicles the lives of five characters as they move through New York City. Taking its cue from multimedia artist editions of the past, this limited edition contains an assortment of media related to Sleepwalkers. "Really, the pivotal moment for me was deciding to address the city itself instead of creating an exhibition that remains the same and simply travels," Aitken explains in a conversation with Jacques Herzog included in the diary. "Like an archaeologist mining images, I wanted to try to dig under the surface of the city's outward image and expose the raw nerves that make this metropolis live and breathe." The die cut slip case box contains a 23-by-36-inch, double-sided poster; a 12-inch vinyl picture disc with unreleased tracks by Broadcast, as well as a live recording of Aitken's opera "the handle comes up, the hammer comes down;" a CD of the same, plus further tracks by acts including Canyon Country and Bibio; two flipbooks with sequences excerpted from the film; a DVD of Sleepwalkers and a street-level walkthrough; and a 96-page visual diary.

For Projects 75, The Museum of Modern Art has published artist Laylah Ali's first book, a work composed entirely of her trademark green-headed, brown-bodied figures engaged in acts of violence. Stock characters such as security officers, sports figures, victims and oppressors that have been the subject of Ali's singular gouche pieces in the past now play out their aggressions in this hybrid comic / artists' book, an extended, nonlinear narrative designed by the artist to be a visual novelette.
40 p.; 18.5 x 24.5 cm.; Staple Bound; Offset Printed

Native Tongues is based on a series of collages made from coloring books and explores social taboos, the subconscious, and gender with familiar commercial iconography. 16 p. Paperback. Binding: Staple Bound. Offset Printed. Edition Size 1000

Inception is inspired by stories and journeys of the refugees. It is a bilingual codex in English and Arabic. The book is based on the twelfth-century Persian verse poem "The Conference of the Birds" written by Farid Aldin Al-Attar. The poem is about the search for truth and integrity, which is parallel to the refugee's quest to re-discover themselves. Birds meet to begin searching for their perfect king. Their leader, the hoopoe, encouraged and supported the birds to be confident, grateful, and honest. Only 30 bids complete the journey, eventually recognize that their king is each of them and all of them. The English text is adapted from Afkham Darbandi translation. The Arabic text is adapted from Badee Mohamed Gomaa Arabic translation “Manteq Al Tayr”. The bird images represented are from medieval Islamic artwork. Arabic Calligraphy is done by Abdul Karim and Sabri. 4.5" x 3.5"; thirty sections with four folios. 2" diameter x 0.75" miniature accordion books. Laser-cut Fabriano and tracing paper, plexiglass mirror, and wood. Coptic binding. Signed edition of 30.

"Japanese artist Emi Anrakuji displays reproductions of her one-off digital prints (made by digitally printing the extraordinary self-portraits for which she is best known) onto e hagaki (picture postcards)." "One Picture Book series was conceived in 1998 as a way to make original artwork affordable. The series consists of uniformly designed, modestly-sized hardcover books, comprising 16 pages that serve as a “canvas” for the artist to display one cohesive body of work. Each One Picture Book is published in an edition of 500 numbered copies, and each contains an original tipped-in photograph, signed on the verso by the artist; hence the name of the series." 19 cm. Edition of 500. Crossett owns number 433.

"And Yet..." is a book of visual fiction, a novella with asemic writing. Asemic writing has no semantic value. Plenty happens and leaves an impression of its happening - but not in familiar language. What does it mean to 'read' a drawing? This series of compositions suggests a narrative for each reader to develop. 48 p. Perfect-bound

Connect Here is a riff on how the world attempts to connect with us by getting into our pockets, mouths, bloodstreams and minds. 8 × 10 in.; 44 pages. Softcover, four color risograph printed book with transparent cover, wire-bound. Edition: 100 books

Grab the Uranium is a bound collection of drawings and paintings by Craig Atkinson, an artist based in the UK, known for applying a wry humor and coarse style in his depictions of the mundane. The book is stencil-printed and handbound. "Grab The Uranium is a collection of recent drawings, which when together create something of a [possibly] factual, dark-ish narrative. The book is about stripy tops, heads on sticks, steps, chaotic happenings and almost real events."
40 Pages, 19 x 25cm, Paperback, Full Colour

An incomplete formal study of certain ornamental forms and their relationship to one another, combined with something like a journal of related ideas and questions. New four-dimensional and "impossible" ornaments are presented. Topics such as chirality, acupuncture, the helix, and consciousness are discussed. "A personal account of a group of questions which sprang up around a particular group of shapes. Topics such as chirality, gesture, Traditional Chinese Medicine and 4-dimensional space are discussed. Features a new "split blackletter" typeface." [158] p., 17 x 11 in. Digital printed. Bristol board case. Staple bound.

Published to coincide with Lisa Anne Auerbach's 2008 exhibition at Printed Matter, this artist's book brings together the various facets of Auerbach's artistic practice, which has included zine making, co-organizing the High Desert Test Sites project, and knitting. Political, relational, humorous, and instructive, it offers the reader step by step instructions on how to knit sweaters and skirts that feature a variety of slogans ("When there's nothing left to burn, you've got to set yourself on fire" and "Yes we can! No we McCain't!" are two examples.) With full-color photos of Auerbach and friends modeling the sweaters. Saddle stitch.

Jnanada Moksha Brahmananda, a self-described "channel of God's love energy and compiler of facts, a lot of which are already available on this plain of existence", came to Auerbach's attention when she was teaching at Claremont and the school newspaper published an article questioning whether or not the the house he lived in with devotees was a cult. Auerbach found not only his spiritual teaching on his website, but also a "brief search on the internet reveals his other true path, which focuses not on the spiritual, but on the material" in the form of 74 Amazon.com reviews of wrist watches. 20 pages : illustrations; 35 x 11 cm, Staple bound

There are no specific instructions for using this deck. Draw single cards or multiples. Shuffle, cut, throw them against the wall and see what sticks. Have an intention, or don’t. It’s a puzzle to be solved, a tool for igniting intuition, a pair of glasses to help you see, or a window into a mystical space beyond language. Find what you seek. The READINGS deck has 78 cards- 70 photographs, 7 colors, and one blank.

PIT is a collection of photographs taken by Lisa Anne Auerbach at Chicago punk and hardcore shows between March and June 1985, when she was a teenager. Most photographs taken in this kind of space are of the bands, but Lisa chose instead to take photos of the crowd: the dancers, the spectators, the partiers, the depleted. The photos are wild, energetic, they refuse to hold still. 80 pages : mainly illustrations ; 27 cm; Perfect binding

Foregrounding the slippages between doing and undoing or not doing, speech and movement-based forms of address, and improvisation and the score, Lauren Bakst traces the forms performance takes, be they in our everyday experiences, intimate and personal relationships, memories, or on stage. Publisher: Wendy's Subway. 28 pages; Risograph; Saddle-stitched. Edition of 125

Each letter of the alphabet is introduced in the style of three-dimensional pop-up designs. Each of the 26 three-dimensional letters move and change before your eyes. C turns into D with a snap. M stands at attention. X becomes Y with a flick of the wrist. Die-cut. Pop up format. Plastic lenticular cover.

An inventive exploration of counting from one to 10 and back again. As the reader turns the pages, the numbers unfold and transform with breathtaking ingenuity. A series of flaps and pop-ups transforms one numeral into another as the reader counts from one to ten and ten to one.
Issued in a slipcase with die-cut "10" on one side and "01" on the other.

29.5 x 84 cm. Offset printed. Small risograph printed booklet. Accordion binding, with with booklets attached with pamphlet stitch binding. Edition of 100.

This book includes 111 paste-ups / collages by the artist composed of gathered dried leaves, grasses and seeds. The materials are selected and arranged in formations that appear as asemic writing reminiscent of handwriting, syllabaries, and the letterforms. In order to emphasize the graphic quality of these works, the book is published in black/white. Edition of 400 copies. Numbered and signed by the artist. 17" x 12.5" x 1.25". 232 pages.

This publication documents the history of one work of Chinese artist Xu Bing, titled Phoenix. The large-in-scale installation was first commissioned by a Chinese corporation to be put in the commercial area in Beijing. The work was created from the construction wastes left from the very construction site of the commissioning corporate party. The artist found it interesting to juxtapose the leftover of capitalist development within the capital itself. The motif of the phoenix corresponds to the idea of rebirth, which the artist saw fit to the context of this commission. 1 v. (unpaged) in envelope : ill. ; 27 x 34 cm.. In Chinese and English.

“This artist’s book examines margin notes found in 12 copies of Walden, while providing commentary on the reading habits of strangers, assumptions about nature writing and learning, and the lingering effects of Thoreau’s classic work. By withholding the original text to focus solely on these marks, Walden Marginalia turns the same kind of close attention Thoreau inspired in his readers onto the readers themselves. Edition of 50. Crossett owns number 31. Printed from photopolymer plates on a Vandercook No. 3. Text hand-set in Scotch Roman and Bondoni types, the closest approximation to those used in the first edition of Walden. The paper is Zerkall Book Vellum. 24 x 15 cm. 70 p. 3 gate fold pages. Case Bound. Letterpress.

The Black School, founded by artists Joseph Cuillier III and Shani Peters in 2016, is an experimental art school teaching radical Black history. The Process Deck is a tarot-style interactive methodology tool for brainstorming and designing creative activism projects. The cards are to be used in an art making capacity to help creatives, educators, and organizers explore how art can activate change on a local level. Through a series of questions and choices participants identify issues of primary significance to them, define the terms and context around those issues and design impactful projects to address them. Terms in this deck reference The Movement for Black Lives, Beautiful Trouble, Universidad de la Tierra, the Black Panther Party's 10 Point Program, various academic dictionaries, encyclopedias, and art education sources including The Tate Modern, Art21, and Armin Hofmann. Information from these sources is intermixed with the practices and working knowledge of The Black School's model, organizers, and advisors.

A Grocer’s Orgy is an artist book that presents an alternate history of Lucas Blalock’s photography using new photographs and previously unseen versions of existing images from throughout his entire body of work. With a title drawn from Baudelaire’s writings on dandyism, the book is designed by Blalock to create new formal and thematic associations through the collaging of already densely layered photographs. Linking together his earliest studio portraits with recent work utilizing overt digital alterations, Blalock builds on his recent approach of embedding additional photographs into the back of a single frame. The artist’s manipulations of images through erasures, cloning, and drawing emphasize what is absent or obliterated in his compositions, often with a poignancy and emotion that is lacking in most digital imagery. The book’s layout further complicates these photographs, with spreads that obscure the ability to determine where an image ends or begins. 156 pages;
7.25 x 9.75 inches; Paperback; Edition of 1200.

From the Alfa flag (in its muted version representing Marissa Alexander, sentenced for firing a warning shot at her husband when he attacked her) to the Zulu flag (representing Ousmane Zongo, unarmed but killed by a NYC officer during a 2003 warehouse raid), this list of mostly unremembered casualties represents part of the everyday reality for people of color. "Stripping the maritime alphabet of its primary colors and replacing them with muted browns and blacks, Mourning/Warning highlights the relationship of Americans of the African diaspora to water, maritime trade, and the need for an alternate means of communication in times of emergency and duress. How do you send a warning call that hatred comes constantly in waves? M/W serves as a method of honoring, mourning, and remembering the slain and wronged as well as teaching our children and ourselves to be vigilant and wary in hostile terrain, where your skin color makes you an easy target." Tia Blassingame. 8.5 x 11"; 32 pages including wrappers. Digitally printed in Josefin Sans typeface. Saddle stitch binding. Signed and numbered. Edition of 26. Crossett owns number 6.

Ghost Writer is Bloom’s way of illuminating the central themes of her work without discussing the work directly. It includes an essay on ways of reading between the lines – a short story by Susan A Davis that is full of red herrings – Joseph Alsop on art forgery – Brian Wallis on photographic evidence – correspondence between Jane Weinstock and Bloom about love letters to and from Flaubert. Double-sided artist’s book. 120pp, 23.2 x 17.5. English and German, 1 colour and 76 b&w reproductions.

"The paradox of militarism and domestic life is presented through fragmented collage and text: In this friendly, freedom-loving land. The text is paired in different combinations, with images of soldiers as well as a happy couple, leading the reader to question the relationship of the two in our land." Paper: Vellum. Printing method: Offset Lithography. 22 x 22 cm.

Mary Jo Bole create drawings for a commemorative book about Columbus, Ohio based on historical facts—and curiosities—from research in libraries and archives throughout the city where she has unearthed historical images of Columbus ranging from the profound and moving to the absurd and hilarious. Bole has distilled the research material into 36 drawings into an artists' book. 9 x 14 in. Edition of 1,100.

"Informed by the closing section in his previous book, Boo Moon, Korean artist Boomoon Kwon has created a new series of high-altitude skyscapes that function perfectly in our One Picture Book format. Boomoon is one of Korea’s greatest contemporary photographers. His work has been widely exhibited throughout Asia, Europe, and the United States. On the Clouds comprises reproductions of twelve images, and one original signed print." "One Picture Book series was conceived in 1998 as a way to make original artwork affordable. The series consists of uniformly designed, modestly-sized hardcover books, comprising 16 pages that serve as a “canvas” for the artist to display one cohesive body of work. Each One Picture Book is published in an edition of 500 numbered copies, and each contains an original tipped-in photograph, signed on the verso by the artist; hence the name of the series." 19 cm. Edition of 500. Crossett owns number 480.

If I Am A Musical Thinker is a statement of the aesthetic, social, and spiritual credo of the influential American composer and writer Benjamin Boretz. Boretz proposes that artistic expression answers primal human needs for experiencing identity through articulation in artistic media; and further, that theoretical reflection is -- constructively or deconstructively. 56 pages; 23 cm

Living in Kilburn for two years, historically the home of the Irish emigrant, Enda found the inspiration to photograph the cherry blossom. The transience of the blossoms has often been associated with mortality: new beginnings and endings. In the Japanese tradition in particular, cherry blossom is an enduring metaphor for the ephemeral nature of life. Wandering the streets of Kilburn, noticing many elderly Irish people and people of many other nationalities too, he began to wonder at the twists and turns their lives had taken, what their hopes were when they were young and moved to the city, and how their dreams had evolved. The cherry blossom, especially in the more incongruous urban settings, became, for Enda, a symbol for these emigrants and for their lives, actual and imagined. The poem Renku: My Last Thirty Five Deaths by Don Paterson works in unison with the selected thirty two images. 14.5 x 20 cm. Letterpressed cover. Edition of 100. Crossett owns number 12.

Free Jazz Communism actualizes Archie Shepp–Bill Dixon Quartet at the 8th World Festival of Youth and Students in Helsinki 1962. Including archive material and documents, commissioned theoretical and historical texts, and interviews, the book edited by Sezgin Boynik and Taneli Viitahuhta contextualizes politics of free jazz music in light of global decolonization movements, anti-war activism, structures of racial capitalism, and forms of avant-garde music. By focusing on concerts of Shepp–Dixon Quartet, leading avant-garde jazz musicians from the US, in the socialist anti-colonial festival in Helsinki, the book is introducing complexities in the usual Cold War stories about the sixties, and pictures politics of jazz as something transcending boundaries of nation-state and capitalist market regulations. Apart from the theoretical and historical overview by its editors, the book includes testimonies of the collective and international spirit of the 1962 Youth Festival, translated documents from Finnish press, a new interview with Archie Shepp, commissioned text by Jeff Schwartz on the historical context of political engagement of free jazz musicians, and reproduction of three hard-to-find texts by Shepp. Published by RABRAB Press. 200 p.; 20 x 13.5 cm.; Sewn Bound; Offset Printed. Edition of 500.

A selection of 13 letterpress prints, all in an edition of one, selected by the artist for their navigation of specific themes of status, excess, ego and connoisseurship. Brannon has selected text from two of the author’s seminal works, Less Than Zero and Lunar Park. Cheerful depictions of liquor bottles, Hollywood awards and 1980’s accoutrements screen-printed on full color pages act as a sympathetic companion to Ellis’s letterpress-laid excerpts. Offset and letterpress printed. Signed by the author and the artist and boxed in a screen printed slipcase designed by the artist. 10 1/4 x 7 1/2 x 3/8.

An Anthology of Chance Operations is an artists' book based on experimental neodada art and music composition that used John Cage inspired indeterminacy. Its full title is: An Anthology of chance operations concept art anti-art indeterminacy improvisation meaningless work natural disasters plans of action stories diagrams Music poetry essays dance constructions mathematics compositions. Crossett's copy is a second edition issued by art dealer Heiner Friedrich in 1970.

"What's Left is a limited edition artist's book which presents a collaboration between the artist and a group of her high school students who each immigrated to the United States as children. The artist interviewed each student and asked, "What is the most memorable object that you left behind when coming to the United States?" 13 unnumbered pages; 20 cm; font is Lato; Mohawk Superfine paper, letterpress printed hand carved woodblocks; Drum Leaf (adhesive) binding; Signed edition of 50. Crossett owns number 38.

In 1990, American conceptual artist David Bunn acquired the Los Angeles Central Library card catalog in its entirety when the LACL transferred to an on-line filing system. The catalog contained roughly seven million cards. David Bunn’s small-format catalog, published on the occasion of a traveling exhibition that originated at Swarthmore’s List Gallery, provides documentation of and insight into the artist’s work with defunct card catalogs. Through installation photographs, reprinted text pieces, and essays by Ian Hunt and Jan Tumlir, the reader is introduced to three of Bunn’s projects from the 1990s: I feel better now, I feel the same way., an ongoing series of poetry books that include The Sea Is a Magic Carpet, and Here, There and Everywhere. 81 p. 17.5 x 12.5 cm. Perfect Binding. Offset Printed

In 1990, American conceptual artist David Bunn acquired the Los Angeles Central Library card catalog in its entirety when the LACL transferred to an on-line filing system. The catalog contained roughly seven million cards. The slim booklet Double Monster (2000) provides the perfect introduction and general context for Bunn’s seven volume epic Double Monster Box Set, an expansive book collection for which he drew upon both the LACL card catalog and that of the Physicians Library and Mütter Museum, a 19th century medical museum of pathological specimens, wax models, medical equipment and curiosities, ordering scans of said cards into provocative, and often funny groupings. 21 p. 17 x 24 cm Saddle stitch / staple bound with yellow paper wrapper. Digitally printed.

The Women’s Studio Workshop invited twelve artists working in the social terrains of California, Kentucky, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, and Tennessee to consider the safety pin’s rise as the symbol of contemporary protest. The resulting portfolio, In Solidarity, captures the waves of distrust, encouragement, criticism, and hope in calls for allyship following the 2016 presidential election. Silkscreen and digitally printed. Edition of 35. Crossett owns number 5. Signed. Loose leaf with case.

Throughout the photobook are interwoven solarigraphs from 32 pinhole cameras on the roofs of houses in the city of Oaxaca, which recorded both the path of the sun, as well as the great earthquake of 2017 that destroyed much of the state. In the story Bustamante draws an analogy between the phantom limb syndrome in which a patient, after having been amputated, continues to feel the now non-existent limb with the lingering presence of the parent long after they have passed away. Paperback.
23 x 21 cm. Sewn binding.

KAKO Enters the Moon Museum is an artists' book in memoriam to the to polish sculptor Katarzyna Kobro (1898-1951) 44 unnumbered pages. 20 cm. Perfect bound. Printing: 8 color Risograph print. Edition of 150. Crossett owns number 18.