Sunday, April 30, 2006
altered books
Altered Books is an exhibition and project at the Portland Library in Maine. Its proposition is that many books are no longer being borrowed for all kinds of reasons (subject for a different discussion), and that alternate [sic] treatments may make them intriguing and appealing all over again. My personal favorite is Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass remade into Fields of Greens (see photo). It may at first 
seem like desecration but library copies are used, not the only extant copy, and the literally recycled project is fittingly relevant to the book itself. How apt it would be to make Sophie Kinsella's Shopoholic books into bright colorful bracelets like this one of a Maggie Dunn book. Anyway, the idea behind the exhibition is best expressed by its curator and artist, Doug Beube: "The book, threatened as it has been in this century by radio, television, film and the Internet, seems determined to survive as a staple of human expression, communication and knowledge." If you go to the Portland Library's search-by-subject page (here) and type "altered books" as the subject, you can page through all 177 altered books, some of which could be borrowed anywhere in the country through inter-library loan.Labels: books, things to do
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