1 00:00:00,330 --> 00:00:04,320 I'm Alex Franklin, the manager of the Southern Centre for the Study of the book, 2 00:00:04,320 --> 00:00:09,810 and I'm speaking to you from the printing workshop, which is located in the public library in Oxford. 3 00:00:09,810 --> 00:00:19,950 In this ground floor room overlooking the quadrangle of the library are several cast-Iron hand presses like this one and a quantity of typed. 4 00:00:19,950 --> 00:00:28,650 The Butlin's Printing Workshop was established in nineteen forty nine to teach students of literature how books were composed and printed by hand. 5 00:00:28,650 --> 00:00:37,690 It is now used throughout the year by students and the community for demonstrations, experiments and making books. 6 00:00:37,690 --> 00:00:47,250 The book arts programme from the bibliographical press includes a printing residency and is supported by a generous private donation. 7 00:00:47,250 --> 00:00:54,700 Today, we are looking into a handmade artist book that came into the building, my very special collections in the past year. 8 00:00:54,700 --> 00:01:04,920 This is body of evidence by Anna Powell, the Cordeiro, and we're delighted to have the audience with the artist with us in this webinar. 9 00:01:04,920 --> 00:01:16,560 The Bodleian copy of this book will be expertly handed, handled on screen by my colleague John Maddox, a curator in the Building Forever section. 10 00:01:16,560 --> 00:01:21,750 I'd also like to say hello in New York to Dr. Mauffray Emory, 11 00:01:21,750 --> 00:01:26,040 associate professor of American literature in the faculty of English at the University 12 00:01:26,040 --> 00:01:31,180 of Oxford and currently a fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study in Berlin. 13 00:01:31,180 --> 00:01:35,800 Rebecca is the author of books including Power Literary The Making of Bad Readers in 14 00:01:35,800 --> 00:01:41,080 post-War America and the Personality Brokers' A History of the Myers Briggs Test, 15 00:01:41,080 --> 00:01:45,760 which is published in the UK under the title. What's your title? 16 00:01:45,760 --> 00:01:48,940 Which seems very appropriate in this context. 17 00:01:48,940 --> 00:01:56,050 And readers of my family's books and essays will know her as a brilliant guide to the imaginative and material interaction 18 00:01:56,050 --> 00:02:07,150 of readers with publications of all kinds and also an astute observer of literary revelations and concealments. 19 00:02:07,150 --> 00:02:12,520 You're there at the Centre for Book Arts with honour. 20 00:02:12,520 --> 00:02:19,420 Yes, hello. And it's kind of extraordinary to be doing an event almost in person. 21 00:02:19,420 --> 00:02:21,400 We are here at the Centre for Book Arts. 22 00:02:21,400 --> 00:02:29,770 The audience might be able to see behind us several printing presses and we are surrounded by over six hundred different types of font. 23 00:02:29,770 --> 00:02:33,850 I'm holding an A and an M in my hands right now. 24 00:02:33,850 --> 00:02:41,680 So I just wanted to invite you to start talking about your book, the process behind it and what it means to you. 25 00:02:41,680 --> 00:02:50,410 It means a lot. It means a lot. This book spans 20 years of my journals and my notes and my experiences, 26 00:02:50,410 --> 00:02:58,510 and they culminated with the anxiety about immigration during the Trump administration. 27 00:02:58,510 --> 00:03:03,670 And I can share with you something that happened to me recently, Facebook. 28 00:03:03,670 --> 00:03:12,910 So it gave you some of the flavour of what my my inclination was when I tried to express the situation towards the book. 29 00:03:12,910 --> 00:03:19,840 I was in a baby shower about a month ago and the gentleman sat with some older gentleman, some of those, 30 00:03:19,840 --> 00:03:27,430 and start asking questions about this woman who said he wanted to go to Brazil, which everybody says and was charming. 31 00:03:27,430 --> 00:03:33,700 He was engaging. He intended to express empathy. 32 00:03:33,700 --> 00:03:42,810 And the way he managed to do that was by saying how determined they should get out of their. 33 00:03:42,810 --> 00:03:50,450 And this deep side just had is my my sentiment toward the book. 34 00:03:50,450 --> 00:03:57,410 I was clocking that fraction of a second before I opened my mouth, Schwester, feeling that I didn't want to hurt his. 35 00:03:57,410 --> 00:04:10,460 I didn't want to tell him you insulted me. But I also had to somehow bring to light the fact it is a privilege had isolated him in such a way that the 36 00:04:10,460 --> 00:04:20,080 understanding that he could achieve charm and engaging by posing a question that come across as racist. 37 00:04:20,080 --> 00:04:26,950 It is just broken, it's like when language falls apart and the feelings and emotions are so charged with that, 38 00:04:26,950 --> 00:04:32,050 people seem to have a disconnect between how they feel and how they express the feelings, 39 00:04:32,050 --> 00:04:46,200 or also when the negativity of a set of circumstances will impress upon itself and will sweat out of the conversation without being invited. 40 00:04:46,200 --> 00:04:54,580 Essentially, that was one circumstance that come to be things like that were noted both my books, my journals over the course of the last 20 years. 41 00:04:54,580 --> 00:04:58,360 I came to New York in 2000. 42 00:04:58,360 --> 00:05:07,150 And incidentally, the answer to the question is I have never left. I couldn't come up to tell him that I had managed to get out of there. 43 00:05:07,150 --> 00:05:17,590 I have never left Pomace with me. And that is a dimension of the immigration perspective that people will rationalise upon. 44 00:05:17,590 --> 00:05:24,160 But I cannot really touch on it unless I have experienced that like I have and like a number of people in our audience. 45 00:05:24,160 --> 00:05:33,250 But we have. So during the past 20 years, in the process of learning English and getting acquainted from a new environment, 46 00:05:33,250 --> 00:05:36,130 I started to make journo's and take notes and journals. 47 00:05:36,130 --> 00:05:46,780 And that is an example of a situation that I have described in my book that later on when where the animosity in relationship to the other. 48 00:05:46,780 --> 00:05:55,330 It escalated to a very pungent point in the past five years, which was unusual, 49 00:05:55,330 --> 00:06:01,030 which hasn't happened to me before, I haven't before 2016 confronted that. 50 00:06:01,030 --> 00:06:12,250 It was it was a very I wasn't prepared for it because I had been here for 15 years and I have never had in subtle ways, 51 00:06:12,250 --> 00:06:17,740 but have never been so blatantly challenges in my assumptions of what. 52 00:06:17,740 --> 00:06:24,970 Right. That had to be here or where do I come from. And this was all accepted and folded in society. 53 00:06:24,970 --> 00:06:32,170 And then over the course of the last five years, those things became abrasive and became the reason for friction and and challenges. 54 00:06:32,170 --> 00:06:36,580 And that is what the book speaks of, mostly in and of itself, 55 00:06:36,580 --> 00:06:44,950 trying to puncture the big bubble that people live in in a way that they lose perspective of how 56 00:06:44,950 --> 00:06:53,120 to how to embrace and welcome and what they feel is a certain sense of possessiveness like this, 57 00:06:53,120 --> 00:07:01,460 just sort of I dimension. And that it creates a lot of material for material to speak of. 58 00:07:01,460 --> 00:07:07,400 I had taken lots of notes and the books because I think we can start to highlight the bueso. 59 00:07:07,400 --> 00:07:20,800 Yeah. Thank you. 60 00:07:20,800 --> 00:07:28,890 You can get back get back real quick to the first page, so that page. 61 00:07:28,890 --> 00:07:30,890 And that's fine. 62 00:07:30,890 --> 00:07:42,830 Yes, that's the one I'm thinking about that that the way that the set it ends does not dagga, the typeface will increasingly diminished in space. 63 00:07:42,830 --> 00:07:48,440 And that is describing a nightmare that I had in relationship to being accepted or rejected. 64 00:07:48,440 --> 00:07:52,580 And the difficulty was just mentioned to me that the difficulty meeting, 65 00:07:52,580 --> 00:08:03,050 reading the first line of the last line is the emotion that I wanted to express, how to navigate the psychic landscape of being at the same time. 66 00:08:03,050 --> 00:08:15,320 Well, in the circumstances. Could you talk a little bit about that faded Mark that's in the upper corner where you all the little Xs. 67 00:08:15,320 --> 00:08:22,240 Could you talk a little bit about that? Yeah, I. I wanted to establish some. 68 00:08:22,240 --> 00:08:29,740 And I think that you have to see that this is where this was the record of a bunch of 69 00:08:29,740 --> 00:08:36,640 circumstances in which it wasn't supposed to be here or wasn't accepted as far as belonging here. 70 00:08:36,640 --> 00:08:45,280 And as such, I wanted to imply a certain amount of regulation and documentation. 71 00:08:45,280 --> 00:08:50,260 And those marks are speaking of where the information that is being read on the page, 72 00:08:50,260 --> 00:08:58,300 on the page that is coming from it's coming from my journals or something that I heard or my photos or what is the language, if it's English, 73 00:08:58,300 --> 00:09:07,030 which is and what where the the the major if it was immature or I story that 74 00:09:07,030 --> 00:09:12,820 I heard or written those deliberations and it repeats throughout the book, 75 00:09:12,820 --> 00:09:21,160 it's meant to be somewhat illegible and that speaks of treating words like texture or language as something that 76 00:09:21,160 --> 00:09:27,490 is tangible instead of just spoken off about something that has a presence that is beyond its own meaning. 77 00:09:27,490 --> 00:09:35,080 If it exists in in in a substract, which is what you hold that you're holding tight. 78 00:09:35,080 --> 00:09:45,680 So that's that is the that's the ultimate engagement with trying to find a voice that I can think of. 79 00:09:45,680 --> 00:09:53,050 Yes, so can you go to that page where you had these words for? Speaking of difficulty. 80 00:09:53,050 --> 00:09:58,220 At this particular page is a reference to something, 81 00:09:58,220 --> 00:10:03,310 a process that was made in antiquity when people had sent letters abroad and 82 00:10:03,310 --> 00:10:11,380 they did not know if the messenger would be alive at the end of the journey, they would do what's called a double tithe document. 83 00:10:11,380 --> 00:10:17,980 The element of an element of the information that should be preserved from the viewer was going to be 84 00:10:17,980 --> 00:10:24,010 concealed and only aspects of the mission so people would know what the letter was and were supposed to show, 85 00:10:24,010 --> 00:10:35,020 but they wouldn't be able to. And what was the content? But they then be able to access the more the more damaging details to say so. 86 00:10:35,020 --> 00:10:39,940 And in this particular case, what I did was I reverse that type. 87 00:10:39,940 --> 00:10:44,920 So if you look up close, that is the back of the letter. 88 00:10:44,920 --> 00:10:51,190 And those letters that are placed are bold and they're black. 89 00:10:51,190 --> 00:10:59,230 Essentially, they were printed in reverse. So from the back of the letter, this is a very shoot from the back of the letter. 90 00:10:59,230 --> 00:11:01,540 I blacked out with black ink. 91 00:11:01,540 --> 00:11:11,950 And you can what you can see from the front of it, from the back of it, is the ink that has resisted the Black Sea of information. 92 00:11:11,950 --> 00:11:19,450 And those are what I would say in my language, would be the incriminating details that I had been here, 93 00:11:19,450 --> 00:11:25,780 that those were the dates and that's what I was doing at the supervisor was collaborating in 2005, which I mentioned. 94 00:11:25,780 --> 00:11:33,460 And those were details that could potentially damage me if one wanted to consider that damaging. 95 00:11:33,460 --> 00:11:37,900 I find it interesting how things can be used in whichever way they are supposed to be used. 96 00:11:37,900 --> 00:11:48,250 The people will take advantage of a circumstance and twist it in a way that can serve the purposes regardless of what the context is. 97 00:11:48,250 --> 00:11:57,130 And that is what that speaks of in a way. And redaction is such a powerful textual tool of our government. 98 00:11:57,130 --> 00:12:04,360 That's what they use to deny people information. And so I think it's brilliant how you've appropriated that for your own purposes. 99 00:12:04,360 --> 00:12:11,100 Thank you. I did that somewhat unconsciously. Have thought about that aspect that you just mentioned that. 100 00:12:11,100 --> 00:12:19,530 Um, yeah. By the way, the book is a shape, 101 00:12:19,530 --> 00:12:30,690 as if I would just quote The Book of Shape as an envelope is a few pages that reflects and opened up a part that is the shape that you see, 102 00:12:30,690 --> 00:12:35,190 and that is also something that cannot be fixed on its foot. 103 00:12:35,190 --> 00:12:42,440 So the book will not stand on its own, and that is a reference to the circumstances. 104 00:12:42,440 --> 00:12:54,230 I particularly appreciate how difficult it is to handle the page that is not a paper, that is a piece of a shower curtain that had to go directly. 105 00:12:54,230 --> 00:13:01,100 And the the the tactile, tactile quality of it is one thing, 106 00:13:01,100 --> 00:13:08,600 but also how it's how it feels like you're going to damage something that is precious or something that has that has a lot of meaning. 107 00:13:08,600 --> 00:13:14,670 And it can also be it can also be destroyed easily. 108 00:13:14,670 --> 00:13:24,730 I think it also does remind us of the flag, the colours of the flag and the sense of danger. 109 00:13:24,730 --> 00:13:28,300 So I am in the red highlights. 110 00:13:28,300 --> 00:13:41,170 It is used throughout the book as a reference to danger and to contextualising what is at the same time exciting and frightening in a way, 111 00:13:41,170 --> 00:13:47,170 the spaces that some people have expressed a lot of curiosity about in terms of process. 112 00:13:47,170 --> 00:13:51,640 But mainly this is an alternative photographic process, 113 00:13:51,640 --> 00:14:00,210 which means that those are ways of creating photographs that did not depend on a lot of equipment at that time. 114 00:14:00,210 --> 00:14:09,040 People didn't have the technology to be able to manipulate photographs or to create certain types of engagement with the images. 115 00:14:09,040 --> 00:14:18,490 And what they did was to use some that those are ways of exposing material, exposing chemicals that will. 116 00:14:18,490 --> 00:14:28,060 Will come primarily on sunlight, so develop the image, and I think that that is a combination of two different processes, 117 00:14:28,060 --> 00:14:35,140 a cyanotype in the ground and what happens when you overlap those chemicals that they became very unpredictable. 118 00:14:35,140 --> 00:14:47,260 So this is essentially impossible to to consistently each one of those elements of the book that are not actually indiscernible, 119 00:14:47,260 --> 00:14:53,380 but which I mean, you cannot really replicate exactly alike, which is part of being a personal experience. 120 00:14:53,380 --> 00:15:00,910 This particular one, I enhanced that aspect of not being quite replicable by adding the folds and the photo. 121 00:15:00,910 --> 00:15:12,290 The paper made it be that the chemicals all around and get overlapping different different densities and that creates a different result. 122 00:15:12,290 --> 00:15:21,920 Speaking of a realist, I appreciate the capacity of creating materials, organic principles. 123 00:15:21,920 --> 00:15:41,200 Thank you, Jim. You can carry on. At one point, could we zoom in on that little chart in the corner that shows the documentation notes? 124 00:15:41,200 --> 00:15:55,980 Any of those top left, up, right? Veiga. 125 00:15:55,980 --> 00:16:08,520 Excellent. Yeah, those cross marks, actually, it is a bunch of reference to that danger, emotion and also Emily Dickinson, 126 00:16:08,520 --> 00:16:15,330 because part of this book was motivated by a heavy by the book by her in which she expressed the desire to go to Brazil. 127 00:16:15,330 --> 00:16:18,840 And it's because of the one thing that she was not able to do. 128 00:16:18,840 --> 00:16:29,880 And that's that that touches me very deeply, because I have in my life access to artistic expression and a community that keeps me in New York. 129 00:16:29,880 --> 00:16:34,200 But I miss home. So it is as if I have not. 130 00:16:34,200 --> 00:16:36,420 Is this as if I do have a choice? 131 00:16:36,420 --> 00:16:46,050 I made the choice I made up to be here and to do my artwork and the prices that I'm going to move to from my background, from my home family session. 132 00:16:46,050 --> 00:16:50,940 But I was also thinking, when you mentioned that the book is in the shape of an envelope, 133 00:16:50,940 --> 00:16:54,900 I was thinking about Dickinson's envelope fragment in fragments. 134 00:16:54,900 --> 00:17:01,230 Right. Envelope puzzle and how you've created something that really resonates with that, 135 00:17:01,230 --> 00:17:09,090 this collection of art that is also functioning as a documentation of its own medium of of creation and of transformation. 136 00:17:09,090 --> 00:17:16,560 Precisely. And how that and how that enduring and how that had such a such a meaning, 137 00:17:16,560 --> 00:17:21,480 such a layer of meaning that was not even welcome as can speak for what was expected. 138 00:17:21,480 --> 00:17:28,380 But the repercussions of her thinking into our lives, into my personal life is over. 139 00:17:28,380 --> 00:17:33,750 The emotion that I find, it just makes my hair kind of raised in the sense. 140 00:17:33,750 --> 00:18:05,980 So it's Kevin. What was one aspect of this book that that. 141 00:18:05,980 --> 00:18:16,210 That is part of the book in itself, was that I had to work really hard to stop doing that because there was always material to be spoken of. 142 00:18:16,210 --> 00:18:22,900 I started off with just a few pages and it kept on growing because of the circumstances, because of the situation. 143 00:18:22,900 --> 00:18:28,030 There is a is matu that there was actually never intended to be there to start with. 144 00:18:28,030 --> 00:18:35,400 And that became part of it because. Because the urgency, the pressing, the the charge of the moment, 145 00:18:35,400 --> 00:18:41,910 maybe that was just impossible to leave behind and it could have carried on working on it, that just had to at some point. 146 00:18:41,910 --> 00:18:53,190 And so you have to move on to something else as supposed to stay on endlessly growing this on projects they often don't speak about colourfulness. 147 00:18:53,190 --> 00:19:02,040 Just one thing I'm sorry to interrupt that little figure that is embedded within the text on a previous page, 148 00:19:02,040 --> 00:19:09,190 there was a very little oval shaped figure embedded within the text. 149 00:19:09,190 --> 00:19:17,130 And I think that's really a lovely thing. It's not easy to see from afar, but we we were we could look closely at the photo. 150 00:19:17,130 --> 00:19:29,550 That is that is one of my tricks to express difficulty and anguish and and the fact that reality is somewhat not quite real and palpable. 151 00:19:29,550 --> 00:19:33,900 This it's it's meant to be this way is hard to read for a reason. 152 00:19:33,900 --> 00:19:41,820 This is a dream in which at some point towards the end of the dream, there was a silver leopard and some of the line of it there. 153 00:19:41,820 --> 00:19:51,910 And that image, if you can lift the face just ever so slightly so you can see that image is like a shimmering, shimmering print of like. 154 00:19:51,910 --> 00:19:56,460 Yeah, it's hard to see. And that's intentional if you have the book in front of you. 155 00:19:56,460 --> 00:20:03,000 And that's part of what it means to interact with the artwork that each person is going to have its own experience on. 156 00:20:03,000 --> 00:20:06,900 It is a little animal in there. It's a cat. It's a cat. 157 00:20:06,900 --> 00:20:09,480 It's a big leopard. Yeah, 158 00:20:09,480 --> 00:20:17,340 it's intended to be that you can see it in a particular position if you're in a very distinct relationship to the page and have the light bounces, 159 00:20:17,340 --> 00:20:24,830 which is the fear that I get when I'm waking up in the morning and I dream profusely and I have to 160 00:20:24,830 --> 00:20:30,330 declare to my mind the regular basis to get rid of all the sort of emotions that come with my dreams. 161 00:20:30,330 --> 00:20:39,930 And that is what comes to be this, the sense of trying to focus on what is important and let go of what is just creating anxiety. 162 00:20:39,930 --> 00:20:50,430 In a way, that's what the difficulty of reading that image comes up to the. 163 00:20:50,430 --> 00:20:52,470 Bookmarks are very particular in that way, 164 00:20:52,470 --> 00:21:00,900 it's not the kind of art the world responds to by being exposed to the kind of art that one's response to, by being intimate with. 165 00:21:00,900 --> 00:21:07,340 And I I understand that that creates certain difficulties that this day and age. 166 00:21:07,340 --> 00:21:15,800 Because not many people will be able to touch this book, but I strongly believe in the power of the one. 167 00:21:15,800 --> 00:21:23,000 And so one of the few people that will touch the book that will create that they will create something that is authentic, 168 00:21:23,000 --> 00:21:31,100 that is even applicable in a way that's part of the logic of the envelope to write what you put in an envelope is not intended for everybody. 169 00:21:31,100 --> 00:21:35,030 Exactly who read it has a recipient. 170 00:21:35,030 --> 00:21:51,950 And so there's always something about the intimacy of an envelope that invites that kind of singular experience, not the. 171 00:21:51,950 --> 00:21:57,940 Is there anything else that you'd like me to show I the screen? 172 00:21:57,940 --> 00:22:05,100 Now, maybe we can just talk about the colourful private. There less about. 173 00:22:05,100 --> 00:22:11,460 Settlement victims have an opportunity to I looked at it, I read the text of this, I mean, 174 00:22:11,460 --> 00:22:19,280 your discussion of this is interesting to me because because I only saw the photographs of the book that were sent to me from the plan. 175 00:22:19,280 --> 00:22:29,130 And so I probably spent more time reading the text than I did, but also just because I'm wildly ignorant when it comes to these questions of process. 176 00:22:29,130 --> 00:22:35,460 So this is really educational for you. You talk about all of this, but this was this was very interesting to me, 177 00:22:35,460 --> 00:22:41,460 in part because it seems like on the one hand and acknowledgements page and on the other hand, 178 00:22:41,460 --> 00:22:47,370 a kind of documentation of how many different people are involved in producing a book like 179 00:22:47,370 --> 00:22:53,250 this and how they each have their own emotional investments in different parts of the book, 180 00:22:53,250 --> 00:22:59,280 the binder, the printer, the artist. You has an amazing community that comes out on this page for me. 181 00:22:59,280 --> 00:23:08,990 I don't know if that tallies with your wonderful with your experience of it, but that is a bit of a nod to. 182 00:23:08,990 --> 00:23:13,950 So the distinction between craftsmanship and artistry, which for me are one thing, 183 00:23:13,950 --> 00:23:18,770 and then the banker, the painter, and there are still the same person, 184 00:23:18,770 --> 00:23:22,280 and that is the play that I do trust, the California, 185 00:23:22,280 --> 00:23:30,500 I'm shifting the highlight between the process and the creation of the and integrating that, as I call it, fun. 186 00:23:30,500 --> 00:23:36,750 Just to give a little background, the colourful is, as I said, 187 00:23:36,750 --> 00:23:44,480 an acknowledgement that technically is what comes at the end of the book describing where the book was made and what the materials are used. 188 00:23:44,480 --> 00:23:48,050 And it's something that functions as a bibliographical reference. 189 00:23:48,050 --> 00:23:56,360 In this particular case, I extrapolated quite a lot from that because I was under the influence of a bunch of different colour forms that I had read, 190 00:23:56,360 --> 00:24:01,310 particularly Walter Hammoudeh, that we have a show of his work. 191 00:24:01,310 --> 00:24:04,030 So that's why what was right and colourful. 192 00:24:04,030 --> 00:24:10,970 And then he would be very playful if he said of talking about the process you talk about or you think about, 193 00:24:10,970 --> 00:24:13,730 you just kind of shifted around to whatever he could. 194 00:24:13,730 --> 00:24:19,670 And the reason why he did that, because he's the artist and he has the power to determine the outcome of any of those pages. 195 00:24:19,670 --> 00:24:25,160 In this particular case, I was very inspired by for another episode, 196 00:24:25,160 --> 00:24:29,840 which is the Portuguese poet that spoke in very different languages and a bunch of defence, 197 00:24:29,840 --> 00:24:34,910 over 70 different writing styles, and each one of them was its own character. 198 00:24:34,910 --> 00:24:42,320 And that is the point of me shifting the focus from the artist to the painter to the binder because they're all one person. 199 00:24:42,320 --> 00:24:46,790 And there were also other people that came forward in other circumstances that have 200 00:24:46,790 --> 00:24:52,640 added to a layer of the content of this book and the production of it in itself. 201 00:24:52,640 --> 00:24:58,430 It's also a reference to several different places in nature, to Emily, 202 00:24:58,430 --> 00:25:07,100 something positive or books that have read and poetry that have come my way or things that I had written in different ways. 203 00:25:07,100 --> 00:25:11,180 Yeah, it is. It's complex. It's it's not behaving well. 204 00:25:11,180 --> 00:25:19,070 It's a of music and it has is like a wild creature that had loads of its own, its own context. 205 00:25:19,070 --> 00:25:23,500 It's also the one part of the book that. My name's Charles. 206 00:25:23,500 --> 00:25:30,190 In reality, other than the redacted pages, and it's intended to be that it can be taken away for the book. 207 00:25:30,190 --> 00:25:37,250 So in essence, this book could have no identity for one page because it's not bound to the book. 208 00:25:37,250 --> 00:25:42,250 If we're to take that one page out of the book doesn't have an identity. 209 00:25:42,250 --> 00:25:46,870 The book doesn't belong to or was not, in fact made by anyone in particular. 210 00:25:46,870 --> 00:25:52,090 It could be the voice of a bunch of people who have been through the circumstance that I have been through. 211 00:25:52,090 --> 00:26:02,020 It has that that that omission. But also, when the page was just moved, the read underneath it, 212 00:26:02,020 --> 00:26:08,110 it's like discovering a crime scene or something and finding blood splatter under underneath the collar. 213 00:26:08,110 --> 00:26:12,940 Yeah. See it. Right. Those are those are clues to some kind of mystery. 214 00:26:12,940 --> 00:26:19,600 Ah yeah. I haven't I haven't processed that those things in terms of a desired outcome. 215 00:26:19,600 --> 00:26:26,590 Those are my goals. But a lot of things came into being in the process of making the book and the bones of the story bones 216 00:26:26,590 --> 00:26:32,380 with the sense of the emotion that I'm trying to convey and with the process of making it look at itself. 217 00:26:32,380 --> 00:26:42,100 But yeah, not many people will remove that, but there will to remove that, we will have that experience, which is open to continuing. 218 00:26:42,100 --> 00:27:03,730 Sansonetti. William. 219 00:27:03,730 --> 00:27:07,940 Is there anything else that you'd like me to show before your shift to the front 220 00:27:07,940 --> 00:27:18,390 cover again so I can speak a little bit of the materials that are in there? 221 00:27:18,390 --> 00:27:26,820 A few different elements in that and and they are elements, they are not a representation of the element of the element in itself, 222 00:27:26,820 --> 00:27:31,680 the gates of Brown that look like pointing out the words of that to the what evidence? 223 00:27:31,680 --> 00:27:38,430 Those are woodblock. Those are pieces from things that I have sanded and embedded in the cover. 224 00:27:38,430 --> 00:27:51,090 And a little bit under the word evidence. There is a streak of mother of Pearl that is, again, the element itself, not a representation of the. 225 00:27:51,090 --> 00:28:01,740 Part of that is to highlight how important it is for me and I guess for the of people experience the work and responding to it, 226 00:28:01,740 --> 00:28:07,560 there is a physicality of it that it is my life that is being exposed. 227 00:28:07,560 --> 00:28:16,070 There is my presence here that has been either questioned or accepted in a way is not a representation of it, is the thing in itself. 228 00:28:16,070 --> 00:28:27,470 And then that might be made books for 10 years now, so 18 years old and this book might have been the one that had been the most vulnerable of at all. 229 00:28:27,470 --> 00:28:33,020 It's probably but it is certainly that it was difficult to make. It was difficult to write. 230 00:28:33,020 --> 00:28:38,420 It was difficult to find very challenging, and it was very difficult to find. 231 00:28:38,420 --> 00:28:46,880 And I did not expect that difficulty. There was something that came as a revelation, how challenging it was to put myself through that process, 232 00:28:46,880 --> 00:28:52,220 even though I have experienced with all the techniques the content made it to be, 233 00:28:52,220 --> 00:29:02,840 there was another layer of eternal struggle to come to diving into a past in a way. 234 00:29:02,840 --> 00:29:11,450 So, yeah, that the the the roughness of those layers of leather that had been saved the way in the way things kind of fell apart. 235 00:29:11,450 --> 00:29:12,320 Speaking of that, 236 00:29:12,320 --> 00:29:24,920 speaking about that that I mentioned of having to go through something that was literally visceral and speaking from a place of great vulnerability. 237 00:29:24,920 --> 00:29:33,780 So it. Well, there is a kind of extraordinary tension between the personal and personal in this book, 238 00:29:33,780 --> 00:29:40,380 so those moments where you've redacted your name or your name is on the phone, but it can be. 239 00:29:40,380 --> 00:29:43,860 Right. And this book could be the product of anybody's experience. 240 00:29:43,860 --> 00:29:52,620 But on the other hand, the text in the book contains very detailed descriptions of physical injuries that you sustained. 241 00:29:52,620 --> 00:29:54,710 Accidents fit in. 242 00:29:54,710 --> 00:30:03,200 And so I really admire that kind of kinship that set up in the book between thinking anybody could have spoken or written or created this, 243 00:30:03,200 --> 00:30:09,530 crafted it into existence, and then the particularity of belonging to one person and one person's body. 244 00:30:09,530 --> 00:30:16,200 Yeah, that's a very astute observation in the. 245 00:30:16,200 --> 00:30:25,430 I think I think it goes with the book to maybe bounce back to the next stage. 246 00:30:25,430 --> 00:30:36,060 That's wonderful. So I think we are going to have a bit of a tour, a mini tour of the Centre for Picards. 247 00:30:36,060 --> 00:30:43,590 Hello, everyone, my name is Carina Reynolds and the executive director of the Centre for Book Arts. 248 00:30:43,590 --> 00:30:48,870 Thank you, Merv, and for that wonderful walk through of your book. 249 00:30:48,870 --> 00:30:56,070 It's amazing to hear you speak about it in depth. They've been watching this and to being over. 250 00:30:56,070 --> 00:31:01,380 I mean, I think almost I been I've been watching this happen over 10 years now. 251 00:31:01,380 --> 00:31:06,250 I think that's about how long we've known each other, but so wonderful. 252 00:31:06,250 --> 00:31:12,280 So thank you for sharing that with us. So we are here at Centre for Book Arts. 253 00:31:12,280 --> 00:31:19,740 A was founded in nineteen seventy four by the artist Richard Manski. 254 00:31:19,740 --> 00:31:26,670 He started the organisation with the idea that artists in New York City needed a 255 00:31:26,670 --> 00:31:34,440 space to have access to the tools and materials that you need to produce books. 256 00:31:34,440 --> 00:31:47,310 And if you can imagine being in New York City, it's actually quite hard if you're living in a sixth floor, walk up to have your own. 257 00:31:47,310 --> 00:31:52,920 Let me give you a view outside of our window here. 258 00:31:52,920 --> 00:32:01,640 So this is what it's like here in New York, and this is the type of equipment that we have. 259 00:32:01,640 --> 00:32:07,020 So right now, we're standing in our print shop in New York City. 260 00:32:07,020 --> 00:32:20,280 And one of the first things you might notice are all of these beautiful or very chaotic, skinny drawers. 261 00:32:20,280 --> 00:32:26,940 This is our letterpress print shop. And each of these drawers contains its own font of type. 262 00:32:26,940 --> 00:32:35,010 We have over six hundred and fifty typefaces here at Seeb or six hundred and fifty fonts. 263 00:32:35,010 --> 00:32:41,610 And each one of these drawers has its own little thing here. 264 00:32:41,610 --> 00:32:49,210 And this is going to be actually pick up something that's a little more recognisable, very hard to see. 265 00:32:49,210 --> 00:32:56,030 They're going to focus anyways, each one of these little things here has its own letter. 266 00:32:56,030 --> 00:33:06,140 So when an artist comes to Seeb and they start to work in our print shop, one of the first things they learn about is how to set type. 267 00:33:06,140 --> 00:33:11,810 And this is one of the key processes that onna used in her project, body of evidence. 268 00:33:11,810 --> 00:33:26,300 So you're all familiar with, let's say, a word processing or email programmes where you're able to easily switch from Bould to Italic, 269 00:33:26,300 --> 00:33:30,920 from Comic Sans to York Times or two times Roman. 270 00:33:30,920 --> 00:33:37,130 And here, instead of easily switching back and forth, you have to pull a whole nother draw. 271 00:33:37,130 --> 00:33:43,070 You have to pull and you have to set and pick up each one of those individual pieces and you put them together. 272 00:33:43,070 --> 00:33:53,930 So on pulled out a really wonderful treat for us here, which is actually some of the type that she set for body of evidence. 273 00:33:53,930 --> 00:33:59,600 So this is that page here again that is showing us. 274 00:33:59,600 --> 00:34:07,040 It has that beautiful, iridescent, very subtle image. 275 00:34:07,040 --> 00:34:13,130 And you can see the type here. It's all letterpress print. It was printed on one of these presses right here. 276 00:34:13,130 --> 00:34:23,060 This is called a Vanderhook proofing process. It's a semi automatic SIMMI manual letter press that was originally developed 277 00:34:23,060 --> 00:34:30,800 to prove also in a word like Microsoft Word and and word processing software, 278 00:34:30,800 --> 00:34:34,460 you're able to easily find and catch mistakes here. 279 00:34:34,460 --> 00:34:47,270 You have to take this type and put it on this press, then print it into it and then read it and make sure that everything's fine. 280 00:34:47,270 --> 00:34:53,430 So that is something that on did for every single copy of this book. 281 00:34:53,430 --> 00:35:06,800 Each of these letters here is handled that by her upside down and backwards and then set up on the press, printed and approved and then printed again. 282 00:35:06,800 --> 00:35:12,710 One of my favourite things about watching the production of this book was that I would 283 00:35:12,710 --> 00:35:18,710 often come into the studio while I was working in the morning or in the evening, 284 00:35:18,710 --> 00:35:24,020 and she would be set up on one of these presses as if this one. 285 00:35:24,020 --> 00:35:28,880 Yeah. Here, I'll show you which press it was, this one here. 286 00:35:28,880 --> 00:35:39,410 So she would often be standing right behind the press, working, having these huge sheets of paper, and they would just be rolling through the press. 287 00:35:39,410 --> 00:35:45,080 And it was always it's almost meditative process, which I really loved. 288 00:35:45,080 --> 00:35:56,870 One of the amazing things that Quba is able to offer to our artists that come in and use our spaces is that we now finally, 289 00:35:56,870 --> 00:36:01,900 after many years, which was, I think, helpful at the very end, while you're doing your colourful, 290 00:36:01,900 --> 00:36:09,320 maybe we have a type catalogue which shows where every typefaces is organised by cabinet. 291 00:36:09,320 --> 00:36:15,290 So if you discover something and you want to know what it is, then you have this here typeface. 292 00:36:15,290 --> 00:36:21,890 If you're looking for something particular and point size if you're looking for something in a particular size. 293 00:36:21,890 --> 00:36:27,650 And that all corresponds to also a type specimen book. 294 00:36:27,650 --> 00:36:35,060 So we do have an incredible variety of typefaces at Centre for Book Arts, 295 00:36:35,060 --> 00:36:39,890 things that are incredibly unique that you would have never seen anywhere else. 296 00:36:39,890 --> 00:36:50,810 I mean, some of them are one or two known fonts in the world of the same typeface, which is kind of amazing. 297 00:36:50,810 --> 00:36:58,910 So Anahad had a lot of options to choose from while she was working on a body of evidence. 298 00:36:58,910 --> 00:37:08,480 So just quickly to tell you a little bit more about how our studios work here at Zebo, we are free and open to the public. 299 00:37:08,480 --> 00:37:15,320 So anyone who wants to learn how to print or make a book can come to Quba, take a class, 300 00:37:15,320 --> 00:37:21,470 learn how to use these presses, learn how to set type, and then they can come in. 301 00:37:21,470 --> 00:37:30,080 And really right now, Monday through Saturday, 11 to four, and they can actually just get dirty. 302 00:37:30,080 --> 00:37:34,940 So we recognise that the fact that you can't have one of these presses in your apartment, 303 00:37:34,940 --> 00:37:42,680 that you can't have a thirty six inch guillotine in your apartment. And so we make that available to the artists. 304 00:37:42,680 --> 00:37:47,780 We also have six to 10 artist in residence per year. They stay here for an. 305 00:37:47,780 --> 00:37:53,510 The year they get to use our presses, they have keys onna is also a key holder. 306 00:37:53,510 --> 00:38:03,410 So it's not uncommon to see her with the artist in residence early in the morning or late at night working on something spectacular. 307 00:38:03,410 --> 00:38:10,140 And you really get to immerse yourself. So we have studio programmes here. 308 00:38:10,140 --> 00:38:14,510 We have classes, we have artist residencies, exhibitions, 309 00:38:14,510 --> 00:38:21,170 which you may have noticed as I was walking into the print shop, as well as an incredible collection. 310 00:38:21,170 --> 00:38:25,560 So with that, I will pass it back to you all. 311 00:38:25,560 --> 00:38:34,500 And thank you for coming to visit me in New York and see here. 312 00:38:34,500 --> 00:38:37,980 So I think we'll just chat a little bit about the book. 313 00:38:37,980 --> 00:38:39,330 That's all right with you. 314 00:38:39,330 --> 00:38:48,690 I mean, I'm so fascinated in here because I usually see books that are much more conventional and on the other side of the process. 315 00:38:48,690 --> 00:38:59,490 So I feel like this is a body of evidence is full of so many different voices, not just your voice, 316 00:38:59,490 --> 00:39:09,780 but the voices of friends, text messages you show Emily Dickinson, as you mentioned, Pascola, William James, Rebecca Solnit. 317 00:39:09,780 --> 00:39:14,910 How did you match those voices to plants? 318 00:39:14,910 --> 00:39:24,340 How did you decide how to visualise different people's contributions to the typical people? 319 00:39:24,340 --> 00:39:29,410 Came as part of the process of the material that is behind the most of it. 320 00:39:29,410 --> 00:39:35,790 So it will cause to different voices, essentially my voice and everybody else's voices. 321 00:39:35,790 --> 00:39:42,570 My voice is normally Sensorites and I Taric, and when I'm speaking of a quotation of somebody else's, 322 00:39:42,570 --> 00:39:52,140 I'm using a service found that is a moment and the context of it comes from what has been under in Rebekah's on its case. 323 00:39:52,140 --> 00:39:52,620 For instance, 324 00:39:52,620 --> 00:40:05,010 I'm speaking about how our writing refers to this dimension of wandering and discovery and the process of process of layering emotions on it. 325 00:40:05,010 --> 00:40:11,760 And that is what you see in the back of her voice. In a sense, I could have changed. 326 00:40:11,760 --> 00:40:19,200 I could have used a variety of different typefaces because of the craziness and it's available. 327 00:40:19,200 --> 00:40:29,310 But I I prefer to be more conservative about it because I didn't want to create a company that could have that can be an 328 00:40:29,310 --> 00:40:37,110 effect of using that many different typefaces that you people feel as if they are in a room that has a lot of clamouring. 329 00:40:37,110 --> 00:40:44,370 And it's a fantasy about a situation the way that certain things would translate in certain ways and different states. 330 00:40:44,370 --> 00:40:50,040 So a visual visual clutter will create a sense of social injustice. 331 00:40:50,040 --> 00:40:54,180 And some people have read about and that I wanted to create them. 332 00:40:54,180 --> 00:40:59,400 I want to be able to control the temperature of the book, so to speak, in a way that's fascinating. 333 00:40:59,400 --> 00:41:07,800 Why those why those voices? So we talked a little bit already about Dickinson's poetry and the sort of effect it has. 334 00:41:07,800 --> 00:41:16,680 Why William James, why Rebecca Solnit, Ypersele? What is it about these interlocutor's that that spoke to you? 335 00:41:16,680 --> 00:41:23,640 Those are passages that I have copied the midterms while I was reading those books or exposer statements review you. 336 00:41:23,640 --> 00:41:28,080 Those are particular passages that I spoke to the moment that I was reading aloud. 337 00:41:28,080 --> 00:41:34,500 And that has an aspect of randomness to it that I find that just fascinating. 338 00:41:34,500 --> 00:41:36,390 But at that particular moment, 339 00:41:36,390 --> 00:41:46,300 I have access to that particular piece of information that was so crucial to where exactly that is the education process to participate in the book. 340 00:41:46,300 --> 00:41:50,160 There are also there's also an aspect of affinity. 341 00:41:50,160 --> 00:41:59,970 We know James has done great studies about the spirituality, psychology of spirituality, so to speak, 342 00:41:59,970 --> 00:42:10,290 and in and the complexities of the discovery of a process of discovery, which is something that I speak of. 343 00:42:10,290 --> 00:42:14,550 Rebecca Solnit is one of my greatest heroes. 344 00:42:14,550 --> 00:42:21,660 Basically everything that she says could have been written about my life in a number of people's lives that I know of. 345 00:42:21,660 --> 00:42:36,990 But in particular for this book, I, I not only welcomed her and embraced her perspective of being able to embrace the unknown and welcome the welcome, 346 00:42:36,990 --> 00:42:40,950 the variables way for another person again. 347 00:42:40,950 --> 00:42:44,220 And then he speaks in Portuguese, which is something that I want to touch. 348 00:42:44,220 --> 00:42:56,830 And the way he is now growing up in Brazil and being exposed to literature classes gave me the sense that he was a kind of a melancholy character, 349 00:42:56,830 --> 00:42:58,710 not very sexy at all. 350 00:42:58,710 --> 00:43:09,360 My my colleagues with such opinions kind of had to be sort of difficult person to deal with this this hurdle we have to cross through. 351 00:43:09,360 --> 00:43:15,130 I never got the feeling for him. I always thought that he was somewhat cheerful in his very negative perspective. 352 00:43:15,130 --> 00:43:22,320 But this approach to life that had an element of element of faith in it. 353 00:43:22,320 --> 00:43:33,870 You speak that throughout our own internal darkness there will be a moment of light and there will be a moment of revelation that is given up, 354 00:43:33,870 --> 00:43:36,780 which was always there. 355 00:43:36,780 --> 00:43:46,320 Well, there are interesting moments in the book itself where you think a situation that you are in is going to turn out very, very bad. 356 00:43:46,320 --> 00:43:52,740 So when you there is a a story that is narrated where you fall and you have a concussion and you 357 00:43:52,740 --> 00:43:59,460 have to go to the hospital and you're worried about both the police and the medical system. 358 00:43:59,460 --> 00:44:04,740 But it turns out everyone is sort of wonderfully sympathetic and you're really well cared for, 359 00:44:04,740 --> 00:44:08,860 which is not what one expects as you're building up to that story. 360 00:44:08,860 --> 00:44:18,400 So do you feel like the bull in in in talking about the politics of immigration or the politics of migration, 361 00:44:18,400 --> 00:44:26,370 do you feel like it does have those moments of optimism where the structures we think are supposed to address actually what you actually work for, 362 00:44:26,370 --> 00:44:33,120 you are actually provide this really strange source of care in a way that New York City always took care of me? 363 00:44:33,120 --> 00:44:37,350 Yeah, and that is something that I think is particular to New York City. I haven't been on many places. 364 00:44:37,350 --> 00:44:42,330 I came from my hometown Salvadori to New York, and I stayed here the rest of my life. 365 00:44:42,330 --> 00:44:48,270 So I'm not that familiar with what happens in other places as opposed to I know from experience. 366 00:44:48,270 --> 00:44:49,230 But I have an excuse me. 367 00:44:49,230 --> 00:44:58,710 So I thought that New York I was in New York to New York and the as an organisation, which is an extremely progressive organisation, 368 00:44:58,710 --> 00:45:07,280 has welcomed the other and has provided for the other and embraced and accommodated the other Detroit some folks. 369 00:45:07,280 --> 00:45:18,900 And it is a tricky suplex. New York Police Department, the vast majority of the people that I know have had negative connexions, but somehow. 370 00:45:18,900 --> 00:45:21,870 I always had good luck with that. 371 00:45:21,870 --> 00:45:30,480 Good luck to the extent that they let me off the hook a number of times, out of, I suspect, again, a sense of protection. 372 00:45:30,480 --> 00:45:40,230 And that is something that is inherent tension between welcoming and questioning presence at the same time. 373 00:45:40,230 --> 00:45:45,150 Well, and also one of the things that you say in the book that really moved me was 374 00:45:45,150 --> 00:45:51,420 that the language or the category of immigrant doesn't quite work for you, 375 00:45:51,420 --> 00:46:01,080 but neither does the category of expatriate and that you feel like you sit somewhere in between or perhaps somewhere outside of or nowhere or nowhere. 376 00:46:01,080 --> 00:46:07,620 Right. And I was just curious to hear you speak a little more about that kind of ongoing. 377 00:46:07,620 --> 00:46:14,250 Right, not knowing what category of other one belongs to. 378 00:46:14,250 --> 00:46:17,970 It's something that I had to settle with to come to terms with. 379 00:46:17,970 --> 00:46:22,710 I think it's very distinctive to human nature to want to know where you'll find yourself 380 00:46:22,710 --> 00:46:27,930 in a particular place and settle with it and feel confident that that's where you belong. 381 00:46:27,930 --> 00:46:38,320 And I haven't gotten into that, even though I feel that I am here and I'm fully presently here to the extent that what I do is basically. 382 00:46:38,320 --> 00:46:41,560 Like, imagine that because of that book that is part of me, 383 00:46:41,560 --> 00:46:49,180 that both the Canada associate myself while at the same time speaks of an experience that is universal, 384 00:46:49,180 --> 00:46:54,470 I hope they do something about this, 385 00:46:54,470 --> 00:47:04,780 something about not knowing what to expect that has made me and a friend of mine had called the long term uncertainty. 386 00:47:04,780 --> 00:47:11,830 And they went through I went to moments ahead of anxiety for a few years that was borderline totalising. 387 00:47:11,830 --> 00:47:15,940 And then I managed to overcome it and come to a point where I'm quite functional 388 00:47:15,940 --> 00:47:22,960 within my within the parameters of my anxiety as long as I respected and respected. 389 00:47:22,960 --> 00:47:32,100 And I think that that is a character that is a result of understanding that. 390 00:47:32,100 --> 00:47:42,570 At the same time, I have a degree of control, but I am and I don't want to say at the mercy because it's sounds like a dramatic, 391 00:47:42,570 --> 00:47:49,660 but I am I am under the influence of circumstances that completely out of my control and have come to peace with it. 392 00:47:49,660 --> 00:48:00,930 I've come to have come to operate within them without letting me paralyse me in the way that it does. 393 00:48:00,930 --> 00:48:08,310 I mean, it's also obviously been an opportunity for a kind of aesthetic pleasure as a great deal. 394 00:48:08,310 --> 00:48:18,780 As much as there is pain in this book and as much as there's agitation, there's also a great deal of beauty that is that springs from that, I think. 395 00:48:18,780 --> 00:48:27,570 And that's what I that's what I liked about about the book that it is it's a body of evidence that doesn't point to any one particular conclusion. 396 00:48:27,570 --> 00:48:32,220 Right. It keeps all of these questions about the long game, about identity, 397 00:48:32,220 --> 00:48:35,850 about what an individual's relationship is to these larger structures around them. 398 00:48:35,850 --> 00:48:41,190 It keeps all of those questions animated. It doesn't it doesn't settle them at once and for all. 399 00:48:41,190 --> 00:48:45,660 And there is no settling. Right? There is no there is no end in sight to the question. 400 00:48:45,660 --> 00:48:49,320 That's what can progress mankind's progress. Right. 401 00:48:49,320 --> 00:48:58,650 I think we should maybe take some questions from the audience. Yes, there are some questions and some of them are very technical about the process. 402 00:48:58,650 --> 00:49:03,750 And some of them are about the book and the life of the book after your creation. 403 00:49:03,750 --> 00:49:14,280 So just to summarise a couple of them asking about what are the technically challenging facts of of that book, 404 00:49:14,280 --> 00:49:20,070 what were the technically challenging aspects of that book to make? What was the most challenging? 405 00:49:20,070 --> 00:49:23,160 And then within that, perhaps a specific question, 406 00:49:23,160 --> 00:49:34,240 what was the process for creating that iridescent medallion effect with the great curiosity about the. 407 00:49:34,240 --> 00:49:39,430 I certainly struggled with the shape of it working when we are working with an addition, 408 00:49:39,430 --> 00:49:43,060 we wanted to be somewhat consistent through such a thing as a variable edition. 409 00:49:43,060 --> 00:49:48,970 But ideally, we are working with not ideally my intention of it. 410 00:49:48,970 --> 00:49:54,110 I mean, those things are all so subjective. So what is the artistic profile of it? 411 00:49:54,110 --> 00:49:56,100 In my case, I wanted to be consistent. 412 00:49:56,100 --> 00:50:05,470 I it's a tension between just embracing the organic aspect of it, that it's kind of wild and determines its own outcome, 413 00:50:05,470 --> 00:50:10,270 but wanted it to be somewhat controllable and be something that I recognised as my own. 414 00:50:10,270 --> 00:50:19,450 And that belongs within itself and it reflects on the mother. The shape was hard to keep that shape consistent throughout the book. 415 00:50:19,450 --> 00:50:24,490 It was a very physically demanding process. 416 00:50:24,490 --> 00:50:30,490 There were there were many layers of many moments of different cuts. 417 00:50:30,490 --> 00:50:37,470 And what's called a G had to create some sort of a. 418 00:50:37,470 --> 00:50:45,750 All to cut through and to replicate that many times it's an additional nine and the book grew quite large. 419 00:50:45,750 --> 00:50:52,410 I did not expect when they said go for that shape, I did not know what I was getting myself into it because I didn't realise how big the book was 420 00:50:52,410 --> 00:50:58,740 going to be as as a reference to material that kept coming and kept them incorporated to the book. 421 00:50:58,740 --> 00:51:00,750 So it was like a mountain that kept on growing. 422 00:51:00,750 --> 00:51:06,990 I figured that something and then I more happened and I have to figure something else out and stay with the process of it. 423 00:51:06,990 --> 00:51:08,460 It was very labour intensive. 424 00:51:08,460 --> 00:51:16,770 The shaking itself and the covers are what's called a like a. process in which you basically strip the finished out of the leather. 425 00:51:16,770 --> 00:51:20,490 And that exposes the sweet side of the leather. 426 00:51:20,490 --> 00:51:26,790 And that's why this weight is very much like a sponge, things you attach to in a way, 427 00:51:26,790 --> 00:51:36,330 that's how the three barracks and other elements are so seamlessly fitting because that becomes a. 428 00:51:36,330 --> 00:51:46,220 Scheme that some people should remember, that something that is also part of why the book speaks of the circumstances in and of itself, 429 00:51:46,220 --> 00:51:53,870 it's a scheme that had been created to absorb different materials in a way, and that is technically challenge is labour intensive. 430 00:51:53,870 --> 00:52:03,860 It's just gruesome. It's very messy, but also very rewarding because it responds to it, responds to it. 431 00:52:03,860 --> 00:52:09,960 I think people responded to it in a level that is more visceral than they would otherwise. 432 00:52:09,960 --> 00:52:19,910 The iridescence, iridescence decency on that cat image, which is a leopard, is a effect of the paper, actually, 433 00:52:19,910 --> 00:52:27,740 that the little paper that is attached to it and gunky is not made out of wood, is made out of bacon. 434 00:52:27,740 --> 00:52:37,070 Press press that has been pounded into it has become like it's something that is very soubry and thin and malleable. 435 00:52:37,070 --> 00:52:45,560 It doesn't behave like ape, but you cannot really glue it like paper. You cannot really teach it like it is paper, but it's not. 436 00:52:45,560 --> 00:52:50,390 And he has a very fine, but it's more like it behaves like silk. 437 00:52:50,390 --> 00:52:59,240 It's like if you were to think of silk in paper form, that's what companies and typically letter press does not get a lot of metallics. 438 00:52:59,240 --> 00:53:08,030 It's a very opaque system. But with gum you can get that response to light in a way because it has its own luminosity. 439 00:53:08,030 --> 00:53:16,790 This is probably so obvious to you and to anyone else who works with these materials, but I'm suddenly really struck by how the natural, 440 00:53:16,790 --> 00:53:24,950 the nonhuman animal, the mechanical and the human all come together in the process of making this book. 441 00:53:24,950 --> 00:53:30,050 Yeah, that's wonderful. We spoke a lot about the printing part of it, but the bindings it's on. 442 00:53:30,050 --> 00:53:39,730 Right. Forgive me for saying that the mind is its own animal, so. 443 00:53:39,730 --> 00:53:46,130 Whenever there's a question for you, what's the potential for books like this in teaching? 444 00:53:46,130 --> 00:53:49,670 Well, it's it's so funny because right before we started this webinar, 445 00:53:49,670 --> 00:53:58,070 I was saying that I have to bring my students to the battalion when I teach Emily Dickinson to look at your to look at your book, 446 00:53:58,070 --> 00:54:03,230 because I think the potential well, I think there are two really important things. 447 00:54:03,230 --> 00:54:08,450 I think, first, the potential is that the same way I'm having an educational experience here, 448 00:54:08,450 --> 00:54:18,620 talking to my students can have the same educational experience and they can understand how the the text of a book cannot 449 00:54:18,620 --> 00:54:27,500 be and should not be divorced from a consideration of the materials that go into making and printing and finding the book. 450 00:54:27,500 --> 00:54:34,280 So just to be more historical in my teaching, I feel very inspired by this. 451 00:54:34,280 --> 00:54:45,170 But then the second potential, I think, is to show how 19th century texts can have these extraordinary twenty first century resonances and to show 452 00:54:45,170 --> 00:54:54,380 my students that we can think Emily and onna together and understand and what I want women in there to do. 453 00:54:54,380 --> 00:55:00,320 I would teach you three together and understand what it means to talk about the long game, 454 00:55:00,320 --> 00:55:06,620 what it means to talk about citizenship and what it means to talk about the nation as 455 00:55:06,620 --> 00:55:13,670 such and how books give us a kind of insight into those categories in this immediate, 456 00:55:13,670 --> 00:55:18,980 embodied, physical and intimate, intimate way. 457 00:55:18,980 --> 00:55:24,140 So this is very inspiring for thinking about my course planning in Michaelmas term. 458 00:55:24,140 --> 00:55:30,260 Wonderful. And I suppose we only have a few seconds to finally ask a lot of curiosity about. 459 00:55:30,260 --> 00:55:40,010 Of course, this is a book you've said, which is and very few copies. How many copies have you produced and is there a practical maximum? 460 00:55:40,010 --> 00:55:47,280 And the there is a there is also a question from our keeper of special collections here at the Bodleian. 461 00:55:47,280 --> 00:55:59,120 Do you tailor this for the recipients? He's interested to know is the copy that's coming to the Bodleian specially tailored for the library? 462 00:55:59,120 --> 00:56:06,590 It's an addition of nine. The limitation on that is that it's too much work. 463 00:56:06,590 --> 00:56:11,000 It's just insane amount of work. Does it take you to make each one? 464 00:56:11,000 --> 00:56:15,740 I can't measure it in time. I have to work on this process and project for about five years. 465 00:56:15,740 --> 00:56:22,280 So it's all painted now. And by the dates me, the pages are printed in folded in shape. 466 00:56:22,280 --> 00:56:28,490 Now, what I have to do before each one gets out of the house is to make the covers and operate the coverage of the book itself. 467 00:56:28,490 --> 00:56:32,690 And that takes me about a month between making copies and making the box at this stage. 468 00:56:32,690 --> 00:56:34,280 And I have been working on it for five years. 469 00:56:34,280 --> 00:56:43,670 So it's quite it's not five years exclusively dedicated to that, but it's it's labour-intensive in a way that I can't really get paid for. 470 00:56:43,670 --> 00:56:48,080 That is the kind of labour that this labour of love you put it on. 471 00:56:48,080 --> 00:56:52,550 And if something is going to work out in the end, then you're going to move on. 472 00:56:52,550 --> 00:57:03,530 But it's not to be asked about your particular expenses I, I have been working on then as the comes. 473 00:57:03,530 --> 00:57:13,200 So I cannot say that I tailored to each one of the colourfulness personal lives, so the book would be commissioned by whoever is the purchaser of it. 474 00:57:13,200 --> 00:57:20,280 But it is I didn't say I couldn't say that I made it for the book that your copy is your copy. 475 00:57:20,280 --> 00:57:26,630 But I can say that the copy that you have was the copy that is produced in that particular time. 476 00:57:26,630 --> 00:57:29,840 And that speaks of where or was it almost emotionally, 477 00:57:29,840 --> 00:57:39,740 because there are things that I do to the letter that if I am somewhat angry or not rested enough, we all reflect in a way or the other. 478 00:57:39,740 --> 00:57:48,230 They are copies that will probably have a particular have more of a kind of a comb centred 479 00:57:48,230 --> 00:57:56,930 language itself and a cops that would betray more emotional than than I had meant it to you. 480 00:57:56,930 --> 00:58:00,980 Thank you. Thank you so much for coming. 481 00:58:00,980 --> 00:58:08,560 Thank you. Thank you to our our audience and the questions which I'm afraid we've we've not been able to answer all of them, 482 00:58:08,560 --> 00:58:13,010 but we will save those and convey this on again. 483 00:58:13,010 --> 00:58:21,470 And thank you to our hosts, the Centre for Book Arts in New York, to Kareem Rennolds for that wonderful tour. 484 00:58:21,470 --> 00:58:27,050 To my colleagues, Joe Maddox, who is handling the book in the public library, 485 00:58:27,050 --> 00:58:32,960 and Steph Springboro, who has been hosting us on the same call behind the scenes very expertly. 486 00:58:32,960 --> 00:58:39,200 And we do hope to see you all again at other events, other online like this, 487 00:58:39,200 --> 00:58:50,292 which is such a great way to connect across the Atlantic or of course, in person.