Blood on Paper: The Art of the Book
Victoria and Albert Museum
15 April - 29 June 2008
Books, books, glorious books, piled high and toppling over; where would we be without our histories and biographies, novels, travel guides and yes – cookery books! The book has been in existence in various forms since the Sumerians began to write in Cuneiform 5,000 years ago, after which each culture developed its own script; Egyptian hieroglyphics, Indian Sanskrit and our familiar Roman letters.
The book has through many forms, from stone tablets to papyrus scrolls and handwritten codexes and to our own bound and printed volume. The printed book dates from 1456 when Johannes Gutenberg, after spending years developing his prototype printing press, published 180 volumes of his Gutenberg Bible. Fifty years later, there were over 20 million books in existence and this circulation of knowledge and ideas played no small part in the blossoming of the Renaissance.
Previously all books had been printed on vellum, a very fine calfskin. However it would have taken one hundred and forty calves to produce the vellum for even one Gutenberg Bible. So, the publisher looked to a new source; a manufactory in Switzerland that was making paper from pulped rags. You might say that this was paper without blood. Since the days of Gutenberg, many artists have come to recognise the convergence of disciplines; art, science and engineering that are inherent in the making of the books. Blood on Paper: The Art of the Book is an exhibition of books and book-inspired installations currently open in the Victoria and Albert Museum.
In this new exhibition artist like Anselm Kiefer, Damien Hirst and Anthony Caro have reduced the book to an art form with installations like Steigend, Steigend, sinke nieder (Kiefer, 2006), Wound, (Kapoor, 2005) and New Religion, (Hirst, 2005). I do not mean ‘reduced’ in a negative way. Open Secret by Anthony Caro is a witty rendition of a modern photocopier, the cover pulled open to reveal sheets of paper stacked inside – but paper actually made from bronze!
Also on display are other bound volumes and sculptures including the beautiful, illustrated Swimmer in a Tank Jazz by Henri Matisse, 1947, and Le Courtesan Grotesque by Joan Miro, 1974. Open until June 29, it is free to the public.
Copyright © Artyfacts 2008
Influences
Stephen Fry and the Gutenberg Press, BBC 2008