Among the many forms that art has taken from paintings to installation art, none is more unique than artist’s books or book art. To loosely define it, it is described as works of art realized in the form of, or something resembling, a book. But this would simply be doing the art a grave injustice because book art by its very nature eludes a straitjacketing definition. The very term artist’s book is under some dispute, with some artists preferring the term book art while others arguing about the placement of the apostrophe. Although this form of art has been around centuries, it found its peak manifestation in the late 20th century.
Artist’s books are not, as may be commonly mistaken, a catalogue of works by an artist or a portfolio or a tome. Every facet of the artist’s books is intricately bound with the theme of actual work, so the raw materials used, the bindings, the form it takes- whether book or scrolls or loose pages in a box, even it’s distribution and dissemination, every aspect is controlled by the artist and are all parts of the artist’s expression.
Today’s, book art is recognized as a separate gender and much effort has gone into creating a separate space for it. Many colleges now offer book art degree and artist’s books have become prized collector’s items. Because of the varied form of book of art, it is less a display-worthy creation than collector’s piece and as a result it is limited to being a premium pursuit of the art cognoscenti. Art metro pole in Toronto and Printed Matter in New York are the two exclusive stores that specialize in book art and double as galleries for the same.
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