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January Issue
2011
Columbia Museum of Art in Columbia,
SC, Presents Rare Book Installation
The Columbia Museum of Art in Columbia,
SC, is offering a book installation, Emily Dickinson and Contemporary
Fine Printing, a companion to the large traveling exhibition,
I Heard a Voice: The Art of Lesley Dill, on view through
Jan. 23, 2011.
The Museum has diverse connections with the University of South
Carolina and this particular partnership brings together and highlights
book arts in connection to visual arts.
The installation, curated by USC Librarian Jeffrey Makala, is
made up of books from the last 50 years and includes a copy of
the poet's first collection in 1890. Dickinson's poems and original
art inspired by the poet and her work are a special loan from
the Irvin Department of Rare Books and Special Collections. This
installation shows how several fine press printers, printmakers,
and book artists have all reacted to Emily Dickinson's poetry
by creating new works. There are finely-printed selections of
her poems, artistic explorations of her work and life, and new
books influenced by Dickinson that recall the personal "books"
of manuscript poems Dickinson created during her lifetime.
The works included in the exhibition include some of the 20th
century's most well-known fine presses including Leonard Baskin's
Gehenna Press and Claire Van Vliet's Janus Press. "A highlight
is Andrew Hoyem's Arion Press edition of Dickinson's works that
was a collaboration with Kiki Smith, whose large body of work,
like Lesley Dill's, has explored many of the themes found in Dickinson's
poetry," Makala said.
A large community of artists, printers, designers, and publishers
are working creatively with the form of the codex book to produce
limited edition fine press books, artists' books, multiples, and
"bookworks." The form is expansive, and many will say
liberating: artists can experiment with multiple processes in
the same work, and play with the structure and conventions of
the book in interesting ways, creating an interactive experience
for their audience in the final product. The combination of "old"
technologies like letterpress printing and engraving can be combined
in equal measure with new digital processes in the same work in
interesting ways. Ultimately individuals are forced to interact
with the book itself, intimately, in order to fully explore its
complexity and meaning.
Dill's works give visual form to poetic texts particularly by
Dickinson. For Dill, words are her 'spiritual armor' and she freely
stitches and weaves them across the surfaces of her multi-layered
works. "Language is the touchstone, the pivot point of all
my work," says Lesley Dill.
For further information check our SC Institutional Gallery
listings, call the Museum at 803/799-2810 or visit (www.columbiamuseum.org).
Carolina Arts is published monthly by Shoestring Publishing Company, a subsidiary of PSMG, Inc. Copyright© 2011 by PSMG, Inc., which published Charleston Arts from July 1987 - Dec. 1994 and South Carolina Arts from Jan. 1995 - Dec. 1996. It also publishes Carolina Arts Online, Copyright© 2011 by PSMG, Inc. All rights reserved by PSMG, Inc. or by the authors of articles. Reproduction or use without written permission is strictly prohibited. Carolina Arts is available throughout North & South Carolina.