Speaking volumes: Women Artists’ Books

[Lucy Lippard]

Speaking volumes: Women Artists’ Books

New York City, USA: A.I.R. Gallery, 1980

10.2 x 15.2 cm.

Edition size unknown

A postcard invitation for an exhibition of Artists' Books by female artists, curated by Lucy R Lippard, which presented a hundred and fifty books by a hundred artists. The exhibition took place at A.I.R. Gallery in New York, from June 3rd to the 21st,  1980.

A partial checklist of the exhibition is below. 

Takako Saito | Würfelstuhl

Takako Saito

Würfelstuhl

Düsseldorf, Germany: Edition Hundertmark, 1979

3.2 x 7.2 x 5.1 cm.

Edition of 75 signed, dated and numbered copies

The 63rd boxed work published by Armin Hundtermark contains three cube chairs, which are filled with small balls.

Valued at approximately $800 US. 

Larry Clark | Untitled Notebook

Larry Clark

(Notebook)

New York, USA: Self-published, 2013

[32] pp., 12.7 x 8.8 cm., staplebound

Edition size unknown

Ten years ago Larry Clark self-published this blank notebook as a promotional item for his website www.larryclark.com, which is already defunct. 

The cover portrait drawing of the artist is by photographer Tobin Yelland, whose skateboard photography is clearly influenced by Clark.

Signed copies were made available through Printed Matter, and sold out almost instantly. 

Endre Tót | Ten Questions

Endre Tót

Ten Questions

Budapest, Hungary: Galeria Adres Lodz, 1973

10 x 18 cm. 

Edition size unknown

Raymond Pettibon

Raymond Pettibon turns 66 today. 

Marianne Vitale | Train Wreck

Marianne Vitale

Train Wreck 

Kiito-San, 2016

10 pp., 10.2 x 1.3 x 10.7", softcover

Edition size unknown

"Train Wreck is the artist's wry look at the infancy of the American railroad, an age mythologized even in its own time as a period of industrial progress and the heroic conquest of the American frontier. But this progress was fitfully achieved, punctuated by incredible, shocking disasters. In a new artist’s book, New York–based artist Marianne Vitale (born 1973) reproduces black-and-white archival photographs of train wreckage on soft, plastic pages, creating an incongruous merger of content and container in a sculptural, compulsively tactile object. Each of the waterproof, pliable plastic pages of this book features a different locomotive carcass or caboose skeleton for readers to re-contort at their leisure. The contrast between the indestructibility of this playtime "bath" book and its imagery depicting the tragic frailty of industrial America's iron workhorses is at once striking and amusing."

- publisher's blurb

Wolf Vostell | 2 de-coll/age-happenings

Wolf Vostell

2 de-coll/age-happenings

Berlin, Germany: Edition René Block, 1965

22 × 10.7 × 17 cm.

Edition of 150

An out-sized influence, given it's low edition number and age (almost sixty), this bookwork is one of the most celebrated example of alternate bindings in the field of artists' books. 

2 de-coll/age-happenings is the first edition published René Block, who had opened his gallery only a year prior, presenting unknown at the time artists such as Gerhard Richter, Sigmar Polke, Joseph Beuys, Nam June Paik and Vostell. 

The laminated pages recount two performances that took place that year, with texts in German. 

The work is valued at between $1500 and $2000 US, depending on condition.