This title was digitized by the Museum of Contemporary Art of Georgia (MOCA GA).
About Atlanta Art Workers Coalition newspaper. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1978-1980 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 1, 1980)
ment with which they were associated during the period of 1913-27. Clive ex pressed a wonderful attitude on the question of access to material in the li brary at MOMA, “Even a child can be a serious student and have serious in tent, which is all that is required to gain admittance to the Library’s col lection.” MOMA is actively collecting artists’ books issued in small editions, archiving one copy and reserving one copy for usage. In fact, many li braries are collecting artists’ books: the Library of the Institute of the Art in Chicago, the Library of Virginia Commonwealth University in Rich mond, Virginia, the Library of The At lanta College of Art, and the Univer sity of California at Los Angeles Li brary, to mention a few. Among the many precedents being established in this field, libraries for the first time are able to participate in the direct ac quisition of art. The hard and fast lines separating museums from libraries from galleries from archives are be ginning to fade away. The Library of Congress has yet to recognize artists’ books as a valid net work. There is still a big question to be worked out: how shall we classify this information. Ed Ruscha’s Los An geles Parking Lots was classified (and no doubt lost) under real estate by the Library of Congress. Martha Wilson, Director of Franklin Furnace in New York City, an archive and exhibition space for artists’ books and performances, presented a lecture on artists’ books from Duchamp to the present starting with a discussion of Duchamp’s Box in a Valise and exam ined the proliferation of bookworks since 1968. Anticipating the epheme ral nature of limited editions, they ask artists to mail three copies which are preserved in acid-free folders. If you are an artist donating your book(s) to the archive, which presently numbers 3000, let them know the year pub lished, whether self published, num ber of books in the edition, and a short statement regarding your book, and include your return address. They are currently cataloging the collection and will shortly publish a bibliography which will include statements by the artists represented in their collection. Stephen Foster, founder of the Dada Archive and Research Center at the University of Iowa spoke on Dada and Constructivist publications. He ad vised all newspaper editors, writers, and magazine staff to take note that Vemulator, an early 1919 Dada publi cation, was distributed at factory gates. The newspaper and magazine format was employed as a means to enter the public consciousness. Ste phen gave a hilarious account of Jo hannes Baader’s project for a world pyramid which he estimated would re quire 400 trillion marks, in 1909, and would require 200 years of world co operation. In 1914, Baader, insisting he was the medium of Christ, wrote his 14 Letters From Christ to Kaiser Wilheim, demanding that the war be stopped. In 1916 he declared that he was no longer the medium of Christ, but was now the new Christ. In 1917 he formed the Jesus Christ Club, the benefit of joining was that you too could be Christ. Betsy Davids and Jim Petrillo, part ners in Rebis Press and Performing. Arts Company, surveyed the develop ment and diversity of bookmaking on the West Coast. California’s pop cul ture was well represented with such bookart examples as the Dick & Pat Fly Swatter in the Key Biscayne Model or the San Clemente model. Among the many other exciting speakers were Felipe Ehrenberg, one of the founding editors of Beau Geste Press and Schmuck magazine, who examined books made by artists in South and Central America and Mex ico and had some interesting stories to relate about art and politics South the border; Chuck Hagen, editor of Afterimage, discussed the use of the book of photographers in the 1930- 60’s; and Herb Hosmer presented a wonderfully illustrated talk on Meg- gendorfer, the chief proponent of me chanical and pop-up books. There were also various panel discussions on book distribution, artists’ books and publishing structures, the problems in art publishing and criticism. Reese Williams, Director of LINE, an arts service organization that gives grants to artists working with the medium of the book spoke of his experiences in establishing LINE. Judy Hoffburg, currently the editor and publisher of Umbrella magazine, has been extremely active in the field of artists’ publications for many years. Most recently, she has edited Artists' Books: An Anthology, to be published in 1980. She discussed the various means of communication among dif ferent areas in the arts, how informa tion is disseminated, the various modes of cooperation and the impor tance of “word of mouth.” She expressed the feeling that many arts book publishers aren’t reaching the right audiences and emphasized the need for development of networks such as cooperative regional mailing services for a number of publishers. She urged the participants to get onto mailing lists, suggesting ARLIS, the American Library Directory, and the Book Publishers Director; she recom mended book artists attend book fairs, citing the New York Book Fair, the San Francisco Friends of Books & Comics, and the CAA convention, held this year in New Orleans. Hoffburg pre sented, from the book dealer’s point of view, the difficulty of buying without seeing the merchandise—you can't be selective unless you see the books, Do you want your Sculpture cast in Bronze? I provide a complete non-ferrous casting service. Call today : (404) 523-3821 Ron McDowell and suggested that it’s best to call ahead and make appointments if one should choose to become a traveling salesman with a suitcase to show your books. And she also called for an im mediate moratorium in art publishing so we can all catch up. The number and volume of work has increased to such a point that high points haven’t even been determined yet. Mankind, it seems, after every de tailed analysis one would care to make, has always lived with artists' books. Why did artists’ books begin to flourish in the ’60s? One explanation offered by Ken Friedman was that the repercussions from three societal ex plosions, population, technology and leisure time, have come to augment one another and have united into one vast wave of creative energy. There are more artists than ever before, they practice more art forms than ever existed before, and they are more curi ous about one another than ever before. Ken Friedman and Peter Frank dis cussed criticism during the last even ing of the seminar. Friedman ex pressed a discomfort, then saying peo ple are too comfortable with the hypo thesis of what artists’ books are, and felt this should be questioned. He asked why 1000 critics in this country aren’t dealing with artists’ books and mentioned the lack of sufficient cov erage of artists’ book activity in the big glossy magazines. In the prolifera tion of publishing activity, he noted that few artists’ books, in his opinion, are good and cited a need to develop a sensitivity for quality. What are artists doing wrong? He encour aged all book artists to take the first step and learn each and every process involved in book production. When people feel compelled to make a book, the book emerges from some sense of urgency or need. If one is making a book to make a book, the book hardly matters. If it is to be worthy, it must count for something; it must be called into the world because it is summoned out of a need. Just because it’s a book makes it no less or more a work of art. The spirit of the book is communicated by the form it takes as a material object. This tremendous activity that has taken place in the past several years in the field of independent publishing is a reflection on the value people place on the communication of literary and visual ideas. The chances for the new, the different, and the truly unique to emerge and find an audi ence are as good or better now then they’ve ever been. As more and more people, in many cases the artists and writers themselves, discover it is pos sible to publish books of quality on a small scale and be successful at it, the wider and better that selection of books will become. See page 11 for important information regarding this publication. 7 The Atlanta Art Workers Coalition Newspaper, January/February, 1980
