Recently I made a trip down to the Twin Cities, where I had the chance to visit the Minneapolis Center for Book Arts in Minneapolis. Heidi recommended that I make the trip back when I met with her, and I’m so glad that I went! The exhibit I saw was called”The Contained Narrative: Defining the Contemporary Artist’s Book.” Although not directly applicable to my current research, the exhibit gave me a lot to consider about the significance of the book as art versus as a way of conveying literature.
One panel that especially made me think was entitled “The Book as Object,” which asserted that “A book may be altered with the artist repurposing the original form and content to create a new narrative.” Along with the various art pieces made of deconstructed books (see an example below), this reminded me of something Dr. Sprunger mentioned at one point. He told me that many old, important books (like the Urry Chaucer) are taken apart so that each individual page can be sold, because a seller can make more money if they sell the pages individually rather than as a combined whole.
Brian Dettmer – 2010
The exhibit forced me to consider where the value is in a book. Is the Urry Chaucer important because of its text, or because of the literal value in each individual page? Or is it important as a whole – important due to some combination of the physical object and the words that compose it? This is the interpretation with which, after much thought, I’ve decided I most agree. There is a special value in the solid objectness of a book when combined with the much more subjective messages it contains.
