Black Studies: Artists' Books

"“It Wasn’t Little Rock” was the response that black students in Arlington, Virginia often gave when asked about their experiences in the newly racially desegregated public schools of the 1960s. It was short-hand for we might have problems but we are not being subjected to the unspeakable hatred that was showered on black students when they integrated Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas in 1957. White students spat on, beat up, yelled insults, destroyed black student lockers, threw flaming paper wads at them in the bathrooms, and even threw lighted sticks of dynamite at and sprayed acid in the eyes of a female black student. To Arlington students, Central High in Little Rock provided the standard for what they might face when integrating their county’s formerly all white schools." As a high school student, the author was named lead plaintiff in Clarissa Thompson et al. v. County School Board of Arlington County (June 1956), a school desegregation class action suit filed in U.S. District Court. 8 x 11 in., 74 p. spiral bound. Edition of 150.

This book relates the stories of Jake, a white male who transitions from female to male, and Ellen Craft, a 19th century black woman, who escaped slavery by passing as a white man. In photographing Jake’s transformation, Sligh explores society’s response to the act of changing one’s identity and re-examines her own fears of crossing the boundaries of gender, race and class. Edition of 46. 26 x 18 cm. Paper: Rives Heavyweight. Printing method: Screen print, digital. Typeface: Clarendon, Bodoni, Gill Sans Bold, Futura and Bookman Old Style. Binding: Case Bound. Signed by the artist.

"I am a black woman. I am an artist. For many years I have been creating work to bring issues of social justice into the public discourse. This book evolved from a project for which I folded origami cranes from pages of white supremacist books for the exhibition: Speaking Volumes: Transforming Hate." In this work, historical elements are used as a framing device to construct the evolution of our shared identity. Illustrated paper wrappers with flaps. Housed in foldout die-cut box with gold foil origami crane inserted into cover slot. Book, cover and case designed by Susan Rhew Design, Inc. and printed by Blue Ridge Printing, both of Asheville, NC. Edition of 1000. Crossett own copy 277. Signed. Perfect bound softcover. Four-color offset lithography.

"This sketchbook was begun in Munich in 1999, when I was 29 years old. Like most sketchbooks it served as a portal between the real world and the realm of her imagination. Although it was never intended to be shared, nevertheless quite a bit of “work” came out of this particular book, including the installation ‘Insurrection! (Our Tools Were Rudimentary, Yet We Pressed On)’, which is in the collection of the Guggenheim Museum. That, however, is an exception to the rule. For the most part the pages in this sketchbook reflect uneasy, unrefined, unfinished thoughts and anxieties, written and drawn with no objectives, no ulterior motives, and no filters." - Kara Walker.
[212] p. 23 x 15 cm. Sewn Binding.

Sudanese artist, writer, critic, and cultural diplomat Ibrahim El-Salahi (born 1930) is one of the critical figures of African and Arabic modernism. While serving as Sudan’s Undersecretary of Culture in 1975, El-Salahi was imprisoned without trial and endured six months of deprivation in the notorious Cooper (now Kober) Prison. During a period of house arrest that followed, he exorcised his experience in the Prison Notebook, an intensely personal work that is both a major historical document and a masterpiece of drawing, its pages filled with remarkable pen-and-ink drawings that demonstrate the artist’s graphic mastery. This bilingual English-Arabic volume, comprises a facsimile of the Prison Notebook; an English translation of its prose; a contextualizing essay by art historian Salah Hassan that addresses the social and political milieu in which it was produced; and contemporary commentary by the artist. 148 pages. 29 x 17 cm. Sewn bound.

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.

"The Testament Project is an exploration and re-conception of the contemporary black experience in America. The first part of this series deals with black men, who are portrayed in the extreme- either as very rich or very poor, they are demonized, infantilized, ridiculed, idolized or hyper-sexualized; and within the art canon there is a noticeable scarcity of black male representation. I give control of the color and lighting to my subjects, in order to create a space that is participatory and empowered. By including my subjects in the creation of the scene in the use of color, I seek to create photographs that portray individuality in addition to their blackness. In the more traditionally lit studio portraits, the subjects are named for their professions to emphasize the depth of their identities, beyond race." Kris Graves. 64 p. Paperback.Perfect Binding. Edition of 200.

The Testament Project is an exploration and re-conception of the contemporary black experience in America. More often than not, black people are portrayed in the extreme—either as very rich or very poor, they are demonized, infantilized, ridiculed, idolized or hyper-sexualized; and within the art canon there is a noticeable scarcity of black representation. "In these glowing portraits, control of the colored lighting is given to my subjects, in order to create a space that is participatory and empowered. By including subjects in the creation of the scene and the altering of color, I seek to create photographs that portray individuality in addition to their blackness." Kris Graves. [52] p. Perfect Binding

"Coloured Publishing" stamped and edition etched on back. Comes with 2 rubber clutches, signed Certificate of Authenticity, and our four-part, hand-made mini zine Killer Breed. Killer Breed lists every date in 2016 that a black man or woman was killed by law enforcement, along with the names of victims and perpetrators. 2" gold-plated pin. 4mm thick. Edition of 100. Crossett owns number 24.

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.

"TOWNIES is a zine cataloging the lived experiences, stories, and imaginations of PoC and LGBTQIA+ folks // who live or have lived in pockets of suburban, rural, and small town America // that have culturally and politically been associated with and claimed by whiteness and bigotry. This is a new vision of Americana. On the fringes, in the heartland, we are here too." 32 pages. 27 x 21 cm. Perfect Binding. Digitally printed.

Lettermen figures the 1965 Alcorn State Braves football team from Lorman, Mississippi. Publisher: Wendy's Subway. Pages: 24. Size: 19 x 13.5 cm. Edition of 125.