Text project - almost finished

This morning, in a caf near Hampstead Heath, I was still having further ideas about how to make the Goa stones* into a "book" - noticing, and noting, useful words while reading bits of the weekend paper. Finding text that will be useful is something the project is about, after all -

I was also still thinking about how to present the final "book object" - just one, on its own? Several in a box? how to label it/them....

Looking back, this project has gone through a lot of different stages for me, starting with the first little book and its "found" words, added to by the "found" photos (abstract close-ups taken in a room that's seen better days). Tackling the Goa stones, I first tried replicating them as round books, then as spun-paper nests, and made boxes and containers for them (notably and variously of silk paper) -
The final idea took as its starting point the Goa stones being seen as a panacea in their time, and regarded as foolish magical thinking from our point of view today, when we have drugs to target specific ailments. Do we have any ideas about contemporary panaceas, and what kind of ailments would they be particularly useful for? Well, there's money - if anything goes wrong, throwing money at it usually helps. And of course there are lots of things wrong with contemporary society. So I developed the idea of "a panacea for society's ills" - a medieval-looking moneybag, sumptuous on the outside (like the fancy cases the stones were kept in) and with the "ills" written inside.

At first I tried to make some "money" to go in the bags, using lead curtain weights so they would be nice & heavy when picked up -
The "soft money" was a non-starter; and the metal coins looked silly and crude - but the glass and stones that I came across while rooting around made me think of something else -
After making a list of society's ills (a long list!) I chose some and screenprinted them onto silk, using the puff binder to give the words a slightly sticky feel -
Out to the Parkland Walk to gather some smooth, round stones (wasn't sure how many I might need...) -
And here are the first of the moneybags - two are velvet, the third was the prototype; one more to make, to replace the prototype -
The contents - easter eggs??! -
Just one stone is much better -
I'd like to write "THROW ME" on the stones - a futile gesture, isn't it....

This has been an interesting and valuable project, and the learning from it isn't quite over (a few final decisions, and the crit, tomorrow) -- at this point, though, I'm ready to move on to something else!

*In the words of the Medicine Man exhibition: "Goa stones are artificially manufactured versions of rare stones formed inside the stomachs of animals (bezoar stones). Originally they were made in India from a paste of clay, crushed shell, amber, musk and resin. Used for numerous complaints, including the plague in Europe, they were especially recommended for poisons. Goa stones were highly valued commodities as is shown by the elaborately tooled gold and silver tripod stands made to contain the stones on display here."

And the Museum of London says: "This compound of bezoar, shell, amber, musk, resin and crushed precious gems came from the Jesuit Pharmacy in Goa, India [in the 17th century]. The 'stones' were imported by the East India Company and were so precious that they often changed hands for up to 10 times their weight in gold. Scrapings mixed with water were drunk to treat stomach complaints, fevers and plague."