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Towards a Just Landscape is one of my favorite artists’ books; it encapsulates the ability and significance artists’ books have to be both powerful and beautiful objects. Beyond it’s beautifully rendered aesthetics of wilderness and the 49th Parallel, a 20-foot clear-cut section along the US-Canada International Boundary, it discusses issues of justice, history, identity, and political and ecological relationships with land. This assemblage was created by Anne Covell originally as a University of Iowa Center for the Book MFA thesis in 2014. Housed in a clamshell case finished with cork paper, Towards a Just Landscape incorporates a folded panoramic map, printed postcards, a saddle-sewn book with interleaved pages and excerpts from Nicholas Brown’s Ph.D. dissertation “Landscape, justice, and politics of indigeneity”, ‘A field guide to new growth’ in the style of a botanical guide, printed elements, and a 20 foot piece of twine. The ethereal transparency of paper in the interleaved book allows for images and text to be seen from a distance, with texts and traces of tepees and mountain peaks ghosting behind each other; this quote from Brown’s dissertation resonates throughout the piece and, if we listen, it’s readers: 

“Yet specters will always penetrate a permeable membrane. If we wish to seek justice beneath the facade of peace, it is our responsibility to allow ourselves to be haunted by them.” 

--Laura 

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For a touch of Halloween spirit, this artists’ book has some recipes for alternatives to fall favorites--anyone interested in the elemental recipe for a human being or seawater? This creative cookery includes perforated tabs holding printed elemental symbols; like any good cookbook, there is room to add your own concoctions and new favorite recipes. ECT elemental cookbook was created by Justin Quinn (a UICB alum) in 1998 using lead and polymer printing techniques in the Center’s beloved Type Kitchen. From the artists’ kitchen to your own, this artists’ book is the perfect companion for aspiring alchemists, Dr. Frankenstein, or dabbling sorcerers. What elemental concoctions would you try next? 

--Laura

x-Collection N7433.4.Q55 E3 1998  

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In this final installment of books inspired by the Artist’s Book Ideation Cards, we highlight an artist’s book by a University of Iowa Center for the Book faculty member, Emily Martin. Who Gets to Say was included in the 2015 exhibit “An Ideation Experience” which highlighted materials made with these inspirational card decks by Julie Chen and Barbara Tetenbaum. Martin commented on the works providing “an exciting overview of the richness and variety that is possible when one works from an imposed set of parameters.” (artist website) Made in an edition of six, this three leaf volume is created in a greeting card format with floral bouquet pop-ups on both sides, each held by cutout figures. Who gets to say questions “how does someone’s marriage diminish someone else’s marriage?” and the hypocrisy of bans on marriage equality. The cutouts of male and female figures frame “I do” and on the verso, two female figures encompass “you can’t”, although both scenes are surrounded by the repeated word ‘love’. A simple but powerful book, this artists’ book is a wonderful example of the possibilities that the Artist’s Book Ideation Cards hold to inspire artists to create works through parameters outlined by chance.  

--Laura