Faculty, Staff, and Alumni!
Janus by Birthe Piontek, a Professor of Photography at ECU, explores the use of traditional still life objects, such as fruits, vegetables, and flowers, to create compelling photographs, often finding similarities in form between the objects and the artist’s own body. In some photographs the objects become an extension of the body, bringing them together as one. All the images were taken in a small corner of Piontek’s studio, utilizing the limitations of space to focus on solely the objects. Janus, the large photobook, was published in 2021.
La Lucha Sin Fin: On Charismatics and Its Persuasive Technologies by
La Lucha Sin Fin: On Charismatics and Its Persuasive Technologies by Amber Frid-Jimenez, a Professor at ECU, explores how the roles of charisma have been altered by the growing presence of technology, referencing “case studies of the Anonymous movement to studies on phonology to revolutionary movements in Latin America” (taken from artist’s website). Through engaging narrative and artworks, this artist book pulls you in to examine what happens when the physical presence of charisma is gone through the use of the internet. La Lucha Sin Fin: On Charismatics and Its Persuasive Technologies was published in 2013.
Library Dérive by Beth Howe, a Professor at ECU, is a collection of four small books. Howe uses the practice of dérive, which was developed by the Situationist International as a method to explore new cities, and instead, uses this method to explore library catalogues instead. Each book is an exploration of a different catalogue, where Howe starts by looking up any topic they’re interested in, and from there briefly explores each new topic that piques their interest. The research in these topics doesn’t need to be deep, or even correct, but is meant to continue the flow of the research. Howe’s own library dérives takes them from researching future cities to Ugo Foscolo, island Dystopias to Nova Zempla, and many more. Library Dérive was published from 2003-2005.
School Spirit by Douglas Coupland, ECU alumni, and Pierre Huyghe explores the story of a dead high school student, reminiscing on the memories of being a teenager. The book uses found text and imagery from real 80s yearbooks to form a nostalgic photobook. School Spirit takes on a goofy and awkward narrative, reflecting on high school as the peak of one’s life. “People in high school don’t know who they are, let alone know what they want to be. They’re larvae.” School Spirit was published in 2002.
NWC #2 Brenda Crabtree, “What Becomes of the Broken Hearted” by
NWC is a series of five books highlighting five different indigenous artists, one of which is Brenda Crabtree, the director of the Aboriginal Gathering Place at ECU. In this small yellow book titled NWC #2 Brenda Crabtree, “What Becomes of the Broken Hearted”, Crabtree writes about how they excel in some things, such as weaving, and are equally mediocre in other things, such as public speaking. Crabtree goes on to write about some of their work, describing their art practice as “traditional contemporary”. Traditional being the use of traditional techniques and materials, and contemporary, through the conversations surrounding aboriginal issues and misconceptions. NWC #2 Brenda Crabtree, “What Becomes of the Broken Hearted” is a quick and compelling read about Crabtree’s life, career, and art practice, that was published in 2018.
Twelve Interdisciplinary Postcards by Interdisciplinary Division, ECCAD, is twelve postcard-sized prints in an envelope made by various artists at Emily Carr University of Art + Design, Arni Haroldsson, a Professor of Photography at ECU, and Laiwan, ECU Alumni, were two of those artists. The postcards vary in style, some as cartoon illustrations and others as soft etchings, but all the prints are in black-and-white. Written on the front of the envelope is, “The context in which the ‘Interdisciplinary’ is applied here is one in which all disciplines are involved, and not specific department or area of research.” Twelve Interdisciplinary Postcards is a fun collection of prints to flip through and gives an idea of what styles and topics artists were working within on campus in 1982.
Artists’ books tend to get creative in their binding methods and spine décor, some of which even branch off into the hardware category! Some of these books got lost in the nuts-and-bolts section at a local hardware store, while others found unique hardware that matched the conception themes of their books, but all seven books have some sort of heavy-duty add-ons.
Placebo by Helen Cho and Colleen Wolstenholme comes in a Velcro fastened case, that once opened, reveals a metal bolt bound artist book. Placebo was published after the duo exhibition of Helen Cho and Colleen Wolstenholme that took place in the summer of 2004 at Artspeak Gallery in Vancouver. Both artists explore the concept of placebo through installation, sculpture, painting, and photography by using substitution as a way to lessen the potential of certain materials. The book features written statements and visual documentation of the exhibition, allowing readers to revisit Placebo.
The Geography of IKEA by Ken Laing is a nut and bolt bound artist book. The book brings together commercial photographs of IKEA furniture and images of the Scandinavian locations that the furniture was named after. All of the images were taken from the IKEA website, Google Maps, or Wikipedia. The pristine commercialized photographs of furniture next to the google street view screenshots plays with this idea of the unreal, both of the images not being able to properly represent a location. The geography of IKEA also provides descriptions of the place, provided by Wikipedia, and the product, provided by the IKEA website.
Depero Futurista by Dinamo-Azari is an artist book bound by large bolts and nuts, that showcases Dinamo-Azari’s sculptures, paintings, designs, advertisements, manifestoes, and reviews he has received throughout his career. The bolts actually allow for the pages to be rearranged once removed, giving readers the chance to rearrange the book if they desire. Depero Futurista is an expansive and spiffy portfolio of the artist’s life.
PIG 05049 by Christien Meindertsma is a glue bound artist book but with a plastic yellow tag attached to the spine. This plastic addition replicates the tags that are attached and used to identify commercial pigs, which may not technically be hardware, but it made the cut! Pig 05049 follows a commercial pig randomly selected from a farm in the Netherlands and tracks the 185 products made from pig 05049. The book features photographs of these items, from obvious food products, like bacon and pigs ears, to less expected items, such as cigarettes and insulin. PIG 05049 is beautifully made, with indented tabs cut out of the paper, and allows readers to reconsider the use of animal products in every day, and unusual, items.
A Sailor’s Calendar by Ian Hamilton Finlay and Gordon Huntly is an artist book bound together by three metal rings. The book consists of a mix of poetry and silkscreened visuals on yellowed paper. The content reflects the title, working with themes of water, sailing, weather, and fish. A Sailor’s Calendar is a short and playful read.
Junge am Kanal : Münster, Juli 2006 by Volker Gerling is a small flip book bound by two bolts that sits inside a small white box. Volker Gerling’s flip books feature portraits of people that Gerling comes across during his hikes through Germany. He travels with his previously made flip books to show the strangers that he’s interested in photographing. In Junge am Kanal : Münster, Juli 2006, Gerling photographed a young boy by a river, who initially looks solemnly into the camera but halfway through the book he breaks out into a smile.
Visionaire 59 Fairy tale: A Collection Of Unique Story Books by Various Artists is a series of eleven books held together by a leather carrying strap. While leather doesn’t quite make the hardware category, the metal pieces that shape the straps counts in this blog! This collection of books is written by modern contemporary artists, like John Baldessari, Bjork, Inez Van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin, to reinvent the classic children’s book fairy tales. The books are incredibly visually appealing and features many unique printed covers, such as lenticular images. Some of the books may give you the creeps, while others are just beautifully mesmerizing, but they’ll all definitely make you rethink the fairy tales you've come to know.
As Valentine’s Day approaches, a time when it seems like everyone is deeply in love, it can be challenging times for those recovering from a broken heart. This week we’re diving into themes of romantic heartbreak, sadness, ache, and acceptance.
Sophie Calle is no stranger to the theme of heartbreak. Her books often reflect the sweet ache of overanalyzing the loss of a relationship. Sophie Calle’s book Take Care of Yourself dissects a personal breakup email sent to the artist from her lover, ending their affair. The book follows 107 women’s interpretations of the email, all formed based on the women’s respective professions. For instance, the book features a proofreader proofreading the email, a lawyer coming to the email’s defense, an actor acting out the email, and even an analysis from Calle’s own mother. The book features written annotations and texts, as well as digital documentation, such as video and photographs. Sophie Calle’s Take Care of Yourself was published in 2007 by Actes Sud.
Flash Cards for Forgetting by Tracy Stefanucci is a deck of text-based cards that explores letting go of an unhealthy romantic relationship. The flash cards compile found text and personal writing in an unorganized manner, meaning each deck /of cards is unique in its narrative. The text expresses universal feelings of attachment, desire, and grief, some sentences being completely visible, while others are crossed out. The form of the flash cards helps readers remember how to forget their own attachments. Flash Cards for Forgetting was published in 2016 by Moniker Press.
Design by Troubles: a book about breaking up by Janet Lobberecht and Jinhan Ko follows the breakdown of the two artists’ romantic relationship. The short book includes images of the couple with text written on items in the background or on their bodies explaining why the relationship hadn’t worked out, such as the text “we are not good for each other” written on a doorway and the “it’s all good” written across both artists’ chests. Design by troubles: a book about breaking up is a collaboration of heartbreak and mutual acceptance. Design by Troubles: a book about breaking up was published in 2000 by Art Metropole.
Fragile by Melek Zertal follows a different version of what heartbreak can entail. The beautifully illustrated comic follows a girl trying to write a love letter in a café while being a far distance away from the receiver. The book considers the longing heartbreak that comes from being in a different time zone than the person you love. Zertal’s comic brings a fun and relatable feeling to a lonely experience. Melek Zertal’s Fragile was published in 2018 by Colorama.
While we’re still in the first month of the new year, what better time to look at a few of the newest additions to the Artists’ Books Collection at the ECU Library! We’ll be looking at five artists’ books that are new on our shelves, on a range of different topics, all by different artists.
Our first read is Herbal First Aid (Assembling a Natural First Aid Kit) by Raleigh Briggs. This welcoming pamphlet-sized book gives readers the inside scoop on how to assemble their very own herbal first aid kits, through equipment checklists, medical instructions, and salve recipes. Briggs’ guide to herbal first aid covers a multitude of injury and illnesses, from cuts, scrapes, gut problems, aches, pains, burns, rashes, bruises, bleeding, to even parasites. This economical zine opens up the accessibility of medical aid through the use of natural resources. On the last page, Briggs compiles a list of online and local Seattle resources for acquiring materials, as well as some general recommendations for sources, like local co-ops and health food stores. Briggs’ lighthearted illustrations and handwritten text makes the subject of first aid feel both personal and attainable.
Notes on Mother Tongues by
Notes on Mother Tongues by Mirene Arsanios is a commissioned piece from a twenty-pamphlet series published by Ugly Duckling Presse in 2020, where twenty authors were asked to write about “collective work, translation, performance, pedagogy, poetics, and small press publishing” (from UDP Website). In this fictional essay, Arsanios writes about the loss of her own mother tongue, and its connections to colonialism and motherhood. Arsanios’ writing poetically flows through the historical events and individual experiences that inform her personal relationship to language and region. Along with Mirene Arsanios’ Notes on Mother Tongues, all twenty published pamphlets from the series are in our collection and are now available to explore.
No new theories by
Kameelah Janan Rasheed’s book, No New Theories, is a new eye-catching work on the shelf this year. The book has page after page of fragmented monochrome poems and abstracted photocopies examining the language of artificial intelligence. These complicated text translations are juxtaposed with black-and-white photographs, some of the images being found and others photographed by Rasheed. The book also has an annotated interview between Rasheed and Jessica Lynne, co-founder of ARTS.BLACK, where they discuss their own relationships to research, knowledge, and pedagogy. The written interview shows both Rasheed and Lynne’s annotations on top of the original, adding to the interview’s content with new ideas and references. No New Theories echoes Rasheed’s installation art practice, where she’s known to cover large expanses of public spaces using the same abstracted methods used in this artist book.
100 Days of Bulimia by Janet Ford is a small, yellow, coil-bound book illustrating the author’s personal experience of living with an eating disorder. Using 100 pages of simple sketches, the book touches on routines and relationships affected by Bulimia. Ford uses the approachability of the illustrations and the book’s form to recount the deeply personal reality of silently living with a decades long eating disorder. One page features a bundle of bananas with Ford’s text, “I’m sorry I yelled at you for helping yourself to one of my bananas… But they were the only food I could safely eat that week.” The coil bound form of 100 Days of Bulimia replicates the appearance of a calendar, letting viewers understand the longevity of living with an eating disorder for 100 days.
Leading Actors N-Z, Volume 12 by Denise Hawrysio features an ambiguous yet intriguing front cover. The silhouette of a person’s head, the face replaced by a void of layered patterns, with a string of text along the bottom that reads, “Height 5 feet 11 inches, Hazel Eyes, Arthur Thompson, 1992”. Leading Actors N-Z, Volume 12 comes from Denise Hawrysio’s The Spotlight Project, where Hawrysio, using an old Spotlight, a casting directory for actors, decided to cut out the faces of all the sitters, as a way to set their souls free. The idea came when Hawrysio learnt that some cultures believe that the photographic process is disrespectful to the spiritual world, stealing the soul of the subject captured in the image. Each actor’s headshot features the same string of information along the bottom, describing their height, eye color, name, and date of headshot. Hawrysio compiled these faceless portraits, binding them back into books, and rephotographed the portraits to reveal the layers below. These photographs were then made into several volumes, where viewers are left to flip through long tunnels of faceless people whose souls have been set free.
This is just a few of the new artists’ books in our collection that are available to view this new year!
Course Description:
This course considers the many ways that artists and cities clash, cross-pollinate and collaborate. Faced with the rapid expansion of city infrastructure, the gentrification and repression of historic communities, and the rising cost of living, the artists and communities highlighted in this syllabus resist and witness change in different ways. Some plant gardens; others take on the role of neighbourhood archivist. Some build community story-telling projects, while still others subvert authorized uses for shared urban spaces. Taken together, each artists’ book offers a different response to the question: what is the role of the artist in the city?
*All resources listed are available within Emily Carr Library’s Artists’ Books Collection.
Part I: Mark-Making
The first section of this course considers the methods used by artists to engage the public or specific urban communities in artistic labour, gentrification and Indigiqueer discourse. These works enlist traditions of print media that developed within a city context, including short-form publications like pamphlets and zines, and urban ephemera such as posters and poetry broadsides.
Textual Bardism
Standard Deviation: What is the Value of Artists’ Work?
Call Number: S756 S73
Publisher: Art Practical
Publication Date: 2014
Together Apart: Queer Indigeneities
Curator: Whess Harman
Call Number: G786 T64
Publisher: Together Apart, Queer Indigeneities 2SQ/Indigiqueer symposium 2019
Publication Date: 2019
Urban Ephemera
Coming Soon!
Author: Diyan Achjadi
Call Number: A345 C66
Publisher: Diyan Achjadi
Publication Date: 2020
Memory Block, Volume 1
Author: Terra Poirier
Call Number: P657 M46 v.1
Publisher: Terra Poirier
Part II: Taking Up Space
Having considered various methods used by artists for communicating with the public, this section addresses art, the body and public space. These artists contend with authorized and accepted uses of public space, documenting how individuals and communities alike navigate social scripts, spatialize resistance to political repression and cultivate community life in hostile conditions.
Performance in/and Public Space
Unlearning Walks
Authors: Catherine Grau & Zoe Kreye
ISBN: 9781927394229
Call Number: P835 G73 U55
Publisher: UNIT/PITT Projects
Publication Date: 2014
Six Actions for New York City
ISBN: 9781928570066
Call Number: P574 C74
Publisher: Creative Time
Publication Date: 2007
Reclaiming the Commons
Hidden Islam: Islamic makeshift places of worship in North East Italy, 2009-2013
Author: Nicoló Degiorgis
ISBN: 9788890981708
Call Number: D445 H53
Publisher: Rorhof
Publication Date: 2014
Grow: DIY Manual
Author: Holly Schmidt
ISBN: 9780986681929
Call Number: S3466 G76
Publisher: Other Sights for Artists' Projects
Publication Date: 2014
A Practical Guide to Squatting
Author: Larraine Henning
ISBN: 9780646904313
Call Number: H366 P73
Publisher: Waxcastle Workshop
Publication Date: 2013
Part III: Storying the City
With an awareness of how art and artists can interact with and shape city environments, this final section moves through approaches to storytelling in an urban context, exploring documentary forms such as the archive, photography and interviews as tools for community empowerment. These artists' books combat the relegation to and erasure of communities in the historical record and their lived environments, concluding with the power of art and storytelling to enhance Black/collective liberation movements.
Recovering Hidden Histories
A Sign For The City
Author: Sabine Bitter & Helmut Weber
Call Number: B477 S54
Publisher: City of Vancouver Public Art Program
Publication Date: 2009
Love Letters
Author: Amie Siegel
ISBN: 9783959050494
Call Number: S584 L68
Publisher: Spector Books
Publication Date: 2015
Küba
Author: Kutlug Ataman
ISBN: 9781902201160
Call Number: A873 K83
Publisher: Artangel
Publication Date: 2004
Towards Collective Liberation
Quilt of Hope: Vancouver Artists for Black Liberation
Curator: Nanyamka (Nya) Lewis
ISBN: 9781989428047
Call Number: M665 B533 Q55
Publisher: BlackArt Gastown; Moniker Press
Publication Date: 2021
When we talk about housing we’re never just talking about buildings, architecture, or real estate – housing is intimately connected to the social realities of our everyday lives. It can be a source of security or precarity, a place where we build community, and hopefully, where we experience a sense of safety. If we’re privileged enough to be housed in Vancouver, we invite people into our homes, we console friends in our living rooms, we share food around crowded tables, we relish in the privacy of our refuge – we populate our homes with memory. Sometimes that all comes crashing down through eviction, unaffordability, job loss, illness, injury, and all the other challenges that come with living in an ever-gentrifying city like Vancouver.
Today we’ll highlight two artists’ books that speak to this tension: between place-making and displacement; between homes for people versus real estate for profit.
First up, Love Letters by Amie Siegel
This book assembles two collections of materials side by side in order to create a dialogue between them. The first is a collection of letters written by realtors, developers, and prospective buyers. The second is a collection of photographs of current homeowners (to whom the letters were written) – predominantly Black families living in a rapidly gentrifying neighbourhood in Brooklyn. The photos show lives lived: gardens planted, stoops sat on, weddings celebrated, streets danced in, and all the other boring (but meaning-making) stuff that makes up a life. The letters tell a different story – one of profit “Top dollar paid $$$,” of persuasion “We hope you will consider our bid,” and of the relentless tide of social, racial, and economic transformation that is well underway: “Our plan is to do a ‘green’ renovation and create a zero-energy house that could become a model project for the neighbourhood!”
Siegel creates tension by juxtaposing these two collections – the photos are archives of a demographic that is actively being displaced; the letters are portraits of those doing the displacing: there are real people on both sides. But while prospective buyers “Love your house!” I wonder if they also have love for the people who used to live there? Will they make space for them to return? To stay? To raise their families there too? And what of the realtors who pledge to buy houses in “any location, any condition – ALL CASH!”
This book tells a story about a specific neighbourhood, Bedford-Stuyvesant in Brooklyn, but it also asks a broader question around how to prevent the displacement of long-term residents who are priced out by incomers with economic and racial privilege. As artists we are oftentimes on the frontlines ushering in processes of gentrification. How do we mitigate displacement? Who’s comfort and security is made important? And most importantly, why have we allowed housing to become a source of profit for some rather than a human right for all?
Title: Love Letters
Author: Amie Siegel
Call Number: S584 L68
Publisher: Spector Books
Publication Date: 2020
Next up, a specifically Vancouver-based project: Coming Soon! by Emily Carr instructor and interdisciplinary artist Diyan Achjadi.
Coming Soon! presents a collection of photographs documenting a durational print installation that took place at the perimeter of various construction sites in Vancouver between June 2018 and May 2019. The project features prints depicting temporary plywood structures, orange webbing, traffic cones, dirt and other raw materials typically found at “sites in flux.” Achjadi wheat-pasted or zip-tied her prints, leaving them intentionally exposed to the elements; As Zoë Chan writes in the book’s preface: “Unlike more conventional public art projects, [Achjadi’s] prints did not function as a permanent monument for present and future Vancouverites; instead they were a fleeting presence in the city.” The prints, like the sites that they reference, were in a near-constant cycle of installation and demolition – which is what ever-gentrifying cities feel like. Chan writes, “the pace of change in Vancouver meant that [Achjadi] was regularly experiencing the uncanny feeling of dislocation…[amid] the whirlwind market-driven cycle of buying, tearing down, building, and selling” (5).
The prints added a rare non-commercial element to the visual cultures of these construction sites, which typically offer “breathless promises of upward mobility (‘Soon you can live in this place, soon you can have this amazing future!’” (5). Of course there are people who can – who have money, or have the means to access it. But for many of us, these promises further alienate us within an “anxiety-inducing socioeconomic backdrop of rapid development, rampant inequality, and skyrocketing housing costs” (3).
But what Chan beautifully reminds us in her conclusion is that “Vancouver’s deeply entrenched neocapitalist ecosystem…contrary to appearances, is far from inevitable” (9). Achjadi shows us how “quietly disrupting the prevailing visual culture of slick promotional hype” can offer a pause, a line-in, an intervention into the glossy narratives that we’re fed about the life we ought to want, the capitalist rules of who gets what and why, and the material and human costs of gentrification.
Title: Coming Soon!
Author: Diyan Achjadi
Call Number: A345 C66
Publisher: Diyan Achjadi
Publication Date: 2020
As bell hooks wrote in All About Love, “We do not have to love. We choose to love.” In light of Valentine's day, here are a couple of artists within the Artists’ Books Collection that not only choose to love, but bring that love into their artwork.
First up, Contact High by D'Angelo Lovell Williams.
This is a stunning book of photography – primarily made up of self-portraiture, though Williams is rarely alone within the frame, instead pictured among lovers, queer family, and kin. In an accompanying text titled “The Dystopic Cinematic,” Tiona Nekkia McClodden describes Williams’ work as “Black mundane surrealism” (87). The mundanity looks like Williams sitting in a rocking chair in a nondescript kitchen having their facial hair shaved by a lover; the surreal looks like multiple limbs intertwined creating a kind of sculptural work of Black figures caught in a dance-like gesture. Then there is Williams bending over to show white underwear stained red, “familiar to many of us, at the edge of a shared shame that is expected following rough sex” (88); and Williams with their head in a lap – seemingly of a family member – the two attached mouth-to-mouth by a red string. The photos are intimate, an intimacy unique to “imagery rendered by Black artists who also are queer and non-binary.” As McClodden explains, “Within this intersubjective and experiential position there is a space that can only be rendered by their hands” (87). Even as this work portrays the everyday-ness of queer Black people sharing love, sex, and intimacy, it is this very ordinariness that makes the work remarkable – it exists in opposition to what McClodden calls “hyper fantastical modes of representation and figuration” (87).
Be your own valentine and sit down with a copy of Contact High – a book of beauty, of kinship, and of the “in-between space[s] that no one sees, that no one knows how to talk about” (91).
Title: Contact High
Author: D'Angelo Lovell Williams
Call Number: W55634 C66
Publisher: MACK
Publication Date: 2022
Next up, Heart of a Shapeshifter by Coyote Park.
A collection of poems, essays, and prose – this book features stories of trans love, polyamory, and queer community alongside conversations about cultural loss and reclamation. Park writes about hook-ups: “I want my body to be toyed with but not my heart” (78), the self-reflexivity of queer love: “I fell deeper into the idea of loving her. / Because maybe, it brought me closer to myself” (43), the power of transitioning: “I am going to construct a body that I made by myself (53),” and also of reclaiming spirituality from the ashes of an all-girls religious school upbringing, saying “My prayers now are to the people in my life, those that came before me and figures I want to hold in great respect” (57). Park gives language to the tension of long-term partnerships: “There is virtue in entanglement but rebuilding / independence through love is the love I want to foster” (36), but also to the tension created by societal expectations of transness, asserting: “NOT ALL TRANSITIONS ARE LINEAR” (69). They talk beautifully about their own partnership, recounting multiple dreams spent in the company of their wife, feeling fully seen and loved: “Healing has been allowing my wife to call me her girlfriend, because I feel known beyond language” (26). And alongside this, they speak about the richness they experience within non-monogamy: “Multi-love is an act of exploration not extraction” (89).
This is a book about love in its many forms – love for oneself, for one's community, for friends and lovers and ancestors alike. Read it aloud to a lover, read it tenderly to yourself; however you do it, just be sure to read Heart of a Shapeshifter.
Title: Heart of a Shapeshifter
Author: Coyote Park
Call Number: P275 H43
Publisher: GenderFail
Publication Date: 2022
Today we’re looking at Artists' Books that speak to the theme of prison abolition. As Angela Davis asks: "What would it mean to imagine a system in which punishment is not allowed to become the source of corporate profit? How can we imagine a society in which race and class are not primary determinants of punishment? Or one in which punishment itself is no longer the central concern in the making of justice?"
The following books engage with this question in really innovative ways. Let’s start with Quilt of Hope: Vancouver Artists for Black Liberation.
While this book is not exclusively focussed on prison abolition or movements to defund the police, these topics are inevitably woven throughout a broader discussion around Black liberation through art and creativity. The book gathers together a collection of 25 artists’ responses to the question: "What is the role of artists in dismantling anti-Black racism?"
Responses vary, but they nearly always circle back closely to Toni Cade Bambara’s assertion that "the role of the artist is to make the revolution irresistible." Contributor Kali Works argues that art offers a foundational framework for visualizing spaces of freedom, saying that "Our role is to give us confidence to want liberation for ourselves, to not be mentally beholden to institutional power." Another Vancouver-based artist, Desirée Dawson, suggests that art can provide models for dissent, explaining that her role is to "offer up ways to disrupt the systems that are failing us." And Emily Carr alum Sade Alexis asserts that the artist’s task is to "create spaces where joy, ingenuity and hope fuels our spirits and our drive for change!" These are all calls to action – whether they ask us to dismantle existing systems, or to help envision futures where those systems become irrelevant. And make no mistake, this call implicates its readers, since "dismantling anti-Black racism is a responsibility shared by all Vancouver residents."
In Quilt of Hope’s final pages, the demands of Black Lives Matter Vancouver are listed, including "abolishing police and prisons, as they serve the primary purpose of oppressing marginalized communities and protecting the riches of the wealthy minority of denizens." What this book does so beautifully, is to map out how intricately art and activism are bound, interwoven – how very quilted together the two are, leaving its readers with a robust understanding of how the demands of Black Lives Matter Vancouver, the passages from visionary local artists, and the art itself, are all one in the same rallying call, since "Art and liberation are kin."
Title: Quilt of Hope
Curator: Nanyamka (Nya) Lewis
Editor: Nic Wayara
Call Number: M665 B533 Q55
Publisher: Moniker Press
Publication Date: 2020
The second book we’re looking at is Ting Chak’s Undocumented: The Architecture of Migrant Detention.
This book examines spaces of migrant detention, asking “How does architecture inflict violence on human bodies and minds?” Through comics, interviews, quotes, and architectural sketches, Chak traces a web of migrant detention centres across Canada, revealing spaces and people made invisible through purposeful isolation. Chak's diagrams and floor plans reveal much about how migrants – held solely because of their undocumented status – are controlled and managed within the prison industrial complex. "Inside, you lose your spatial bearings and markings, you lose your identity, and subjecthood" one page reads. Another says "Inside, they never let you see the horizon." This manufacturing of isolation and otherness is profitable beyond just fortifying borders, reinforcing white supremacy, and ensuring an exploitable labour force – it’s big business, and growing. Chak’s website explains that migrant detention centres are "the fastest growing incarceration sector in North America's prison industrial complex," adding that "there are billions of dollars made in the incarceration of human bodies” (Arendt in Chak). It makes sense, then, that these locked away bodies are made invisible; as Chak forwards, “The detention centres, too, are undocumented.”
But Chak does that work of shining a light into some of the darkest corners of the Canadian prison system, illuminating parts of a migrant’s journey so rarely portrayed, since we typically see representations of “linear progressions from home to host nations.” And too, this book shows us that architecture is not neutral, that the anonymous individuals who design spaces of confinement are complicit, just as we are all complicit in the making, and potentially the un-making, of the spaces, borders, and relationships that make migrant detention a reality.
Title: Undocumented: the Architecture of Migrant Detention
Author: Tings Chak
Call Number: C435 U53
Publisher: Architecture Observer
Publication Date: 2014
For more library resources on policing, prisons, and abolition, please check out this guide.
Today we're looking at two Artists' Books that speak to the theme of work. 'Cause when are the politics of labour not relevant?!
Let's start with Jessica Vaughn’s Depreciating Assets.
This book offers us a study on the alienating spatial conditions of modern-day office jobs. Vaughn’s collection of photos, writing, xeroxed images, and diversity training video stills, all work to conjure an acutely sensory experience for her readers: the buzz of fluorescent lights; the smell of old carpet tiles; the feeling of corrugated plastic; the colour pallet of government-grade stationary which, in its standardization, works to “limit choice…thereby ensuring visual and material consistency and the ironing out of difference.” This book shows us, rather than tells us, how modular architecture works to reinforce the capitalist notion that workers are disposable – replace the furniture, replace the worker! Vaughn speaks specifically to the process of invisibilization and exploitation of Black workers and workers of colour, asking “Do minimalist design gestures and open floor plans exist outside conditions of race, class and labor?”. After 129 pages of painstakingly illustrating her point, she answers simply “They don’t.”
Title: Depreciating Assets
Author: Jessica Vaughn
Call Number: V284 D47
Publisher: Printed Matter
Publication Date: 2021
Next up, Terra Poirier’s Non-Regular.
This book ought to be required reading for Emily Carr students, faculty, and staff. While the contents offer no surprises to non-regular faculty (i.e. sessionals and lecturers), I venture that the average student at Emily Carr knows very little about their instructors' conditions of employment. If you’re learning about the politics of labour in a theoretical way, say in your humanities classes, this book will compliment that theory by bringing to life actual lived realities that couldn’t be more relevant to your time here at Emily Carr. After all, the majority of classes are taught by non-regular faculty! Through testimonials and interviews – most of which are anonymous for fear of repercussion – alongside photographs and pinhole portraiture, Poirier maps out the realities of contract teaching: low wages, lack of job security, limited health coverage, inadequate work space, and an absence of recognition or support. As a member of the Emily Carr community, you have a stake in the politics of labour here – and for that reason, I urge you to pick up a copy of Non-Regular.
Title: Non-Regular: Precarious academic labour at Emily Carr University of Art + Design
Author: Terra Poirier
Call Number: P657 N66
Publisher: Unit/Pitt Projects
Publication Date: 2018
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This is Gioia 1, one of 5 book structures in the collection from Claire Van Vliet. I was immediately taken with these structures, especially Gioia. The woven binding, visible along the spine and between each leaf, was hard for me to make sense of- it held very securely, yet did not restrict the pages movement, allowing the book to be easily opened flat. The open spine formed a beautiful accordion of the woven strips, sturdy yet delicate.
I soon discovered that these structures came from the book Woven and Interlocking Book Structures by Clare Van Vliet and Elizabeth Stiener. This book describes an array of creative and unique book structures where binding is done without the use of any adhesive, instead relying on careful weaving and folding techniques to secure them. Instructions in hand, I decided recreating the structure would be the best way to understand and explain it.
The instructions called for coverstock or light card for the leaves and covers, and a thin strong paper (ex. Elephant Hide) for the weaving strips. I didn't have any paper of this type, so I experimented a bit. The printmaking paper I tried first creased and got dirty, but the same card I used for the pages ended up working alright for the strips as well. I think it could be really interesting to experiment with different materials here, other papers, thin plastic, or even fabric.
Broken down, the structure is quite simple. Slits are cut on each leaf, 3/4in from the spine edge in an A B A B pattern- this creates the alternating paths for the strips. One leaf is added at a time, the strips folding back and forth between each page to form the accordion that holds them in place. This can be seen clearly in the photo of the spine below. One result of using the same card for the strips was this more expanded accordion form- my version also had 8 leaves instead of the original 4. The right photo below shows the attachment of the cover- A piece of card double the width of the leaves, folded in half and secured with notches to hide the woven join inside.
My finished version of the book! There is so much room to play and alter this basic form using colour, different numbers of strips, or by varying their sizes. Woven and Interlocking Book Structures provides a great understanding of the form for anyone interested in exploring. Available in the Emily Carr Library here!
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