The Arbitrary Text of Wreckage

a r t i s t ’ s b o o k

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p r o j e c t b a c k g r o u n d

This artist’s book (sample pages shown above) was part of Art House Co-op’s “Sketchbook Project 2014”, once housed at the Brooklyn Art Library, as well as in its companion Digital Library. The Sketchbook Project was an evolving, growing collection of creative works in the form of sketchbooks contributed each year by individuals world-wide. The Arbitrary Text Of Wreckage toured North American cities for many months.

a r t i s t ’ s s t a t e m e n t

The bookwork is based on the poem of the same title, which I wrote ten years prior and published later. The Arbitrary Text Of Wreckage is yet another example of my preoccupation with fragmented narrative and our determination to complete our collective and individual stories. As with my other visual works, or textworks, this artist’s book provides another way of re-imagining and engaging with the ideas in the poem.

b o o k d e t a i l s

Single copy: 5″w x 7″h, 32 pages, archival digital ink on ivory antique laid paper; Canson Mi-Teintes end papers; card cover re-papered with Japanese Shin Inbe hemp, Nepalese waxed, and Tibetan banded papers; re-bound with waxed linen thread.

Since 2014, this book had been permanently housed at the Brooklyn Art Library in New York City. In 2022, while in transit to a new location, a substantial portion of the library’s collection was destroyed by fire. The Arbitrary Text of Wreckage was one of those that did not survive.