"Overdue" exhibition

The bulk of the show is in the library entrance area, with more work scattered in the stacks -

Chris's video "In Explanation of the Book" is showing on the monitor, and his QR code book in the vitrine directs you to his website -

Karen's work includes "Haptophobia" - glass slides with a text about fear of touching -

The glint of gold is the spine of one of Janet's 46 "Page 46" books -

She tried to shelve each book in its subject area -

On page 46 of each book, she has added a relevant quote from her extensive collection of quotes -

Carolina's "Forest Library" is mainly in the special collections cabinets at the far end of the library -

It's part of her LivingBooks project -

My shelf of Black Books still has room for more. "Field Potential" is standing open (momentarily) - it's big, and heavy, and doesn't fit on the little shelf, yet all it contains is a notebook, a reflective surface, and a little wire -

Late addition - Janet's "nest of words" -

 My "Unheard" (knitted audio tape) is on the shelf above.

The show guide is printed on A4 and folded, for people to take away with them. In the finished version, blue dots in the relevant areas of the map guide people to the non-obvious parts of the display.

Here's what we each said about ourselves -

AN OBJECT OF MY OWN MAKING
“The walls of books around him, dense with the past, formed a kind of insulation against the present world and its disasters.” – Ross MacDonald
 Karen Apps is exploring our emotional relationship with the book and how aspects of this originate in early infancy.
website: karenapps.weebly.com


PAGE 46
DNA – THE ULTIMATE READ
In our DNA, contained in the structure of each of our 46 chromosomes,the history of humanity is written. Through the creation of the zygote and ultimately the exchange of DNA, this germinal point of communication and commonality contains hope and light in a darkening world.
    In 46 books, on page 46 of each book, Janet Bradley has stamped quotes from various ages and sages. The imperfect print represents imperfect voices emanating from the heart. The intention is that their words will resonate with the poetic light that exists within all of us.
    The books are inserted into the stacks, 46 books along from the ends, and can be identified by their gold spines.
website:  janetmarieart.co.uk


HANDLING COLLECTION
Inside Margaret Cooter’s black boxes lurk secret lives – stories that happen in the dark, enacted by objects and materials whose interaction must be imagined rather than read. The books themselves may be reluctant to open ... take care, you can only guess what you might find.
website: margaretcooter.co.uk


THE LIVINGBOOKS PROJECT
Carolina Diaz’s LivingBooks project is an ongoing investigation into the phenomenon of life, through the medium of artist’s books.
    It involves the intervention of books with plants and seeds, intervention of nature with book objects, and the re-interpretation of organic form through book structures.
    Cabinets of curiosities, irrational taxonomies, herbarium, apothecary, forest as library, library as forest …
thelivingbooksproject.blogspot.com
www.eleusis-arts.co.uk


IN EXPLANATION OF THE BOOK
Chris Gibson shows you a book in the same way the police might show a photofit image.  It asks for recognition.
    We all have a relationship with books.  A book might release a flare, illuminating an unknown landscape, another could reveal a deep pool with hidden treasures in the depths.
    Of course, a book might just be a utilitarian bundle of pages ...
website: christophergibson.co.uk

And, for completeness, the handout that sits beside my shelf of Black Books, giving a few more words to help people think about each -

CARESS

“As if a phantom caress’d me / I thought I was not alone” – Walt Whitman

FIELD POTENTIAL

The term “field potential,” used in physics and neurophysiology, refers to the difference in electrical charge across a gap. When the book is closed, do electrons jump the gap and make a current flow? Do creative sparks fly?

HERE AND THERE

“And where you are is where you are not … here and there does not matter / We must be still and still moving ”  – TS Eliot, Four Quartets

LUCKY

“Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity” – Seneca

RELEASE

“If your life is burning well, poetry is just the ash” – Leonard Cohen

UNTITLED (MALICE)

“Every other enjoyment malice may destroy” – Samuel Johnson

WHISPER

 “Whisper words of wisdom, let it be” – The Beatles