448 artists' books: narrative book.

the biggest, most in-depth project for artists' books was, by far, this one, my narrative book. i decided to construct a 48-page book illustrating a homeless journey i took at the beginning of 2007. long story short — i slept in my car (Etta) for 4 days and documented it with pictures and a narrative the day i got back. it was fun to re-read my experience and put this book together.

the technicalities: first of all it's a stab-bound. i laid the pages out very sporadically, just how my trip was lived: completely random, and printed separations in reverse. i printed all the black from the 48 pages on 48 plates and all the color ink onto another 48 laser printer plates (that's why the reverse printing). i did transfers using Xylene Solvent onto a random stack of colored card stock that i had laying around. this required many hours on the press at school.

i used book cloth to cover book board for the covers. i also used a Lazertrans transfer and matte medium (decopauge) to put a photo "Etta and I" on the cover. and spot varnished it with an embossing treatment. to cover the inside of the covers, i coffee-stained local maps of the areas i traveled in. i also used specific maps throughout the book to give the reader a sense of where i was at that moment in the story. the book, in general, is pretty random and uniquely messy, exactly like my trip. and wa la - there you have it:











due to the many ink blemishes that happened by accident in the letterpress room, i already started a new cover for the book. it's essentially the same, just this time i used a light blue book cloth and i made the 'etta and i' image more clear. this time you can see me in the reflection of the taillight, hence etta and I. it should be done real soon...