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The Art of the Book
Third Annual Exhibition of Handmade and Altered Artist Books

April 25 - May 31, 2008    •   Reception for the Artist: Friday, May 9, 6 to 8pm

Jody Alexander, Kelly Lee Barrett, Tim Barrett, Doug Beube, Macy Chadwick, Rosemarie Chiarlone, Claribel Cone, Betsy Davids,
Cathy DeForest, Luis Delgado, Marie Dern, Kathleen Edwards, Daniel Essig, Foolscap Press, Alisa Golden, Don Guthrie, Cheryl Higgins, Charles Hobson, Nif Hodgson, Rodger Jacobsen, Claire Kessler-Bradner, Laura Kimpton, Lisa Kokin, Vince Koloski, Mary Risala Laird,, Shanna Leino, Mary V. Marsh, Zea Morvitz, Howard Munson, Katie Murken, Sara Newman, Ninja Press, Nance O'Banion, Yuka Petz, Lisa Rappoport, Elizabeth Sher, Sherwin Beach Press, Helen Stanley, Livia Stein, Erin Sweeney, Jane Swinerton, Seiko Tachibana, Tim Tate, Kazuko Watanabe, Heather Wilcoxon

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Turn the page on any concept of what you thought a book could be and expand your thinking. Start with the experience which is a book and approach it as a medium for art.  Think about shape and rhythm. Think about text, meaning and the thousand different forms that letters make, the shape of poems and the textures of symbols on a page. Think about bindings – about fabrics and touch – about threads and stitches. Think about morphing the shape of books so that the pages tickle the senses like the folds of an accordion.  Perhaps you might choose to add woodblock prints or etchings that present themselves as a surprise to one who turns the page. Take a book and retranslate the pages into form. Orchestrate all of these choices into an object which is whole unto itself; a single finely crafted opus.

This years exhibition promises to be an even broader look at the scope of what a book can inspire as a medium for fine art.  In addition to the Bay Area luminaries that have become gallery favorites: Lisa Kokin, Charles Hobson, Julie Chen, Marie Dern, Howard Munson and others, we have made some interesting additions from around the country.  From Tim Tate in Washington DC, we have brought in “reliquaries”, his homage to the book in glass encased video objects which preserve the culture while pushing the medium.  Doug Beube is kindred in spirit to Lisa Kokin in his finely wrought alterations of books that forge new meanings from familiar texts. Shanna Leino from New Hampshire and Daniel Essig from North Carolina celebrate the form as a finely crafted entity, carving in wood and bone and joining Jody Alexander in her concern with the book as a deeply appreciated purely visual phenomenon. 

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