Codex IX International Book Fair & Symposium
Ath’wart Press will be at CODEX book fair at TABLE #155. Come visit and see my latest artist books as well as collaborative works with poet/artist judi goldberg under the imprimatur of Off Press.
Come for crumples & tea with conversations!
10 10th Street Oakland, CA 94607
For more information about Codex: www.codexfoundation.org
CODEX VIII International Book Fair: April 10th through 13th at the Craneway Pavilion in Richmond
REMINDER:
I will be exhibiting artist books
under the imprimatur of
ath’wart press at TABLE 26.
What you might like to know about ath’wart press here and more at https://www.brookeholve.com/athwart-press:
ath’wart and “resistance”
—what role it plays in my art practice
—when I feel it, how I respond
—Do I react to or hold the feeling?
—Do I have other words to describe this experience? ie. willfulness, frustration, steadfastness, others?
Recently I read Roni Horn’s latest book, Island Zombie, Iceland Writings. She devoted an entire chapter to “weather reports”. We have our own internal weather reports, which for me the “resistance” front often shows up and passes through. I found her words insightful: ”The weather’s like that. If you don’t fight it, you become one with it and vanish. You cease to exist if you don’t show resistance and cunning. Some people are said to have an eye for the weather but that goes hand in hand with having an eye for life in general. They’re doubtless better hunters and fishermen and notice more things in nature.”
Resistance shapes. And it was an act of resistance that introduced me to art.
An ath'wart story:
I did not set out to be an artist and it took me awhile to proclaim that I was. My father planted the seed although at the time I did not realize it and he never did. Driving by an abstract sculpture one day he exclaimed “Why would anyone make something like that!” Internally I remember questioning “Why would anyone make something like that?”
Little did I know at the time, that turning a statement into a question was an act of transgression and the beginning of a life as an artist. Questioning opened a way.
The Or Not - An example of an art project that would not have happened if I had not encountered the “resistance” front. Ath’wart honors the role of mistakes and the opportunities offered while working. Artist Books (extracted from The Way Things Are catalogs) will be on display at Codex VIII, Table 26.
Another ath’wart story:
Eric Johnson, founding and former director of North Bay Letterpress Arts, had an exchange with his #2 son, Dino recently. His son occasionally sends him nonsense compositions. He recently sent a two-liner picking up on the oddness of one of my favorite words.
I once fought athwart
I lost
To this Eric responded:
We had a funny moment in the shop four years ago when Brooke Holve encountered a word in a text she was studying and called out to those of us in the room: “guys, what does ATH-wart mean? We tactfully explained that it was pronounced with accent on the other syllable and that it meant across the main direction etc etc. She had the reaction that it was very funny how wrong she had been and how ignorant. From that day on, she invented ATH-wart Press…it’s all explained on that web page.
To which Dino replied:
Ha! She athwarted athwart! They said it couldn’t be done.
Just for that, a bonus, no charge, dedicated to Holve Athwart:
Greed peels sweet needle skin
Up yup hip dippy rub grape space in ripped up crumb humps?
Like you said
CODEX VIII International Book Fair: April 10th through 13th at the Craneway Pavilion in Richmond
DATES: April 10 - 13, 2022
LOCATION: Craneway Pavilion 1414 Harbour Way So. Richmond, CA 94804
HOURS: Sunday, April 10 12:30 pm - 5:30 pm
Monday, April 11 12:30 pm - 6:00 pm
Tuesday, April 12 12:30 pm - 6:00 pm
Wed, April 13 10:00 am - 3:00 pm
PROGRAM: Information at https://www.codexfoundation.org
ADMISSION TICKETS: Multi Day $35.00; Single Day $15.00; Student (w/ID) $10.00
More about ATH’WART in the blog post following.
Three years ago at CODEX VII, 2019.
The artist books to be featured at the fair were part of two installations on the topic of extraction exhibited last year at the Seager Gray Gallery in Mill Valley and North Bay Letterpress Arts in Sebastopol.
Catalogs of the installations below:
Source Material and Evidence of Process
features an installation by two artists, Brooke Holve and Catherine Richardson.
The exhibit opens at the Seager Gray Gallery in MIll Valley on July 1 and will be on view till the end of July. The opening reception is on July 10th with a conversation by the artists at 3:00 followed by a reception from 4 - 6.
I have been collaborating with Catherine Richardson on this topic of extraction for over two years. The installation will look at the global impact of our much coveted cell phones on the environment. Digging deep into the components of a cell phone, the artists reveal connections between its “smartness,” the mining industries and humans’ relationship with the earth.
For more descriptive information on the installation, click “Press Release” below.
A PREVIEW: Plexiglass & Mixed Media, Shelves of Objects that reflect the artists’ processes, Projections and Artist Book
This installation is part of a larger movement of artists, “Art On The Edge Of The Abyss” a multimedia, multi-venue, cross-border art intervention that will investigate extractive industry in all of its forms (from mining and drilling to the reckless exploitation of water, soil, trees, marine life, and other natural resources). The project will expose and interrogate extraction’s negative social and environmental consequences, from the damage done to people, especially indigenous and disenfranchised communities, to ravaged landscapes and poisoned water to climate change and its many troubling implications
.Below are pics of the catalog/exhibition guide, published by the codexfoundation.org compiled by Sam Pelts.
Materiality Re_Mined pgs 110 - 113 in the catalog. A digital “sketch” of our mobile phone project that seeks to expose the trail of minerals and elements mined to build the devices we depend on.
A rhythm of weather effects—light blinding rays offset by gray belting hail and rain. A spectacular and felt side show as my table was located on the aisle closest to the industrial sized windows of the Craneway Center in Richmond at the Codex International Book Fair.
I enjoyed every minute of this event. Where else can one experience a gathering of book artists from all over the world? Over 200 exhibitors from more than twenty-five countries shared their quality books along with engaging conversations on their creative processes.
The international focus this year was Codex Nordica and artists from Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark and Finland were represented. Special to me as I have been traveling to Iceland for artist residencies since 2012. Last summer I taught Book Iceland at the Gullkistan Center for Creativity and met two of the artists as they presented the work of Airkir (www.aikir.wordpress.com), to the class. Eight from the group came to Codex. I invited them up to the NBLA shop in Sebastopol after Codex. They accepted. So, two days after the closing, we hosted what mushroomed into a delegation of ten artists: six from Iceland, three from Norway and one from Sweden. The whole afternoon was charmed. There was a lunch next door, then a showing of each other’s books, and finally sitting down with coffee and cake to talk about how we might collaborate or at least stay in touch. It was a wonderful ending to a week of non-stop conversation and contemplation on the medium of artist books.
The San Francisco Center for the Book is currently hosting the Nordic letterpress collaboration exhibition, Posted/Unposted. The exhibition opened before Codex and will run to April 29th.
I have been invited to present a talk during this exhibition on Book Iceland, a class I taught last summer at Gullkistan Center For Creativity in Laugarvatn to artists from the United States, England, Germany and Iceland. I will report back on my experiences there in the talk I have titled, Land & Texture: Exploring Iceland For Content in Artist Books. Inspired by the natural energies which shape Iceland’s landscape, the participating artists explored materials, tools, and processes, forming the content for their artist book projects.
The talk is scheduled for Tuesday, April 2, 6–8 pm at the San Francisco Center For The Book on 375 Rhode Island Street in
San Francisco, CA sfcb.org
Mark your calendars.
