One for the books

coffee beans, a coffee tree and bookish mice

About 9 years ago J. L. Sullens and I drank our coffee each morning like it was a serious project. For several months we collected and saved each of our used coffee filters so I could make six unique artist books titled “Coffee Beans Plus H2O”. Each coffee filter, after our breakfast use, was hand washed, dried and then pressed flat. When all of the filters were dry and flat I made the book pages. Each book was six pages long, hand printed and hand sewn. Thirty-six coffee filters were used to make my six books. We saved more filters than thirty-six because not all filters were book-usable and I wanted to have extra just in case I made mistakes during the art making process.

This week my last copy of "Coffee Beans + H2o" was sold by the Abecedarian Gallery in Colorado for the public collection of the Indiana University libraries!

How fun is that?!

My book has also been exhibited in the Bainbridge Island Art Museum which has several of my other artist books in their collection!

So you can get a sense of how unique each Coffee Beans Plus H2O book is (every filter has its own coffee stain patterns, there are slight variations in my hand-printing…) here are two videos showing different editions of "Coffee Beans + H2o"

At the Abecedarian Gallery -

At Bainbridge Island Art Museum -

What sparked my idea for Coffee Beans Plus H2O: I was thinking about time and how to depict the intricate parts of small units of time. Then one morning I was waiting impatiently for our drip coffee maker to finish dripping already. (Our coffee pot at that time didn't have the pause/pull a cup feature) And yet I encouraged myself to be patient because every single drop of water through the coffee grounds and filter was important. So…aha! A way to depict time!!

Because time was ultimately my theme I thought handmaking each artist book with used coffee filters would itself imply time passages. To further emphasize time I hand carved rubber stamps and stamped “drip” in a rhythmic pattern in the center of the filters. That you can see the art through the thin coffee filter pages adds to the time effect I was going for. Then I collected the now-dry stamped filter-pages and handsewed the bindings for each book. The act of a reader turning the page is what reveals a cumulation of time.

Here's a still photo so you can see the implied the passage of time…

An artist book is an art object conceived and created by hand that combines visual art, storytelling and a 3D sense of space in order to express an idea. Multiple media and methods are used to make artist books; block printing, sewing, painting, photography, drawing, mixed media… almost anything. But while they are often formatted like conventional books the point usually isn't trying for a mass production “bestselling” status ala mainstream publishing. The point is to express and explore thoughts in a mutual way between artist and reader.

Here's my sketchbook page somewhat about that…

Artist books are unique or limited edition works of art that you can hold in your hands and look at like a book. Handling them is the point.

Even when I use Blurb to make my artist books available in a print on demand format, especially my children's books, like I did for my most recent book The Rag Dog, or like I do when I've reproduced my sketchbooks (links here and here) I'm thinking of my entire book project like an artist book. My books are only printed when someone orders one so they're still rareish. Yet they're printed on tough paper so a kid can really read them. (Here's the link for the book the kid in this photo is reading.)

Sometimes I'll have a few book copies at my galleries or at one of my local independent bookstores. But I'm content to let my book reproductions be special and even rare.

A few people have told me they've purchased my children's books and sketchbooks for their Little Free Library!

I love that!

As a variation of the idea of artist books I've been doing what I call “Edgy Art” for a local stationary shop Eryngium Paperterie in Vancouver Washington. “Edgy art” is my handmade fore-edge paintings on carefully chosen books. These one-of-a-kind books can be displayed, fore-edge out, on shelves as artwork - and read like the books they are. I picked these books to do my fore-edge painting on because I've read them and found them delightful and I hope other people will too. Here's a video looking at my most recent edgy art books delivery to Eryngium Paperterie. (For my subscribers Eryngium will ship my edgy art books! Link here)

Here's a photo of my Edgy Art books currently on the shelves at Eryngium - which the new books in the video will have joined.

Several of you asked for my blue cat holding the WTAF cup from my last post to become one of my art mugs … so I made one for you. Link here.

Of course I can't talk about books in general without mentioning the book I'm currently reading: Mona's Eyes by Thomas Schlesser. It's about a grandfather and grandchild who go to a museum together to look at art and have conversations. (Link here)

I hope you too will have a good book to read and some beverages and snacks to enjoy today. Here's another page from my morning sketchbook this week…