hendricks in Adema & Hall 2013
arly related arguments that follow - with the book
becoming a ‘democratic multiple’ that breached the walls held to be separating socalled high and low culture. Many artist-led and artist-controlled initiatives, such as
US-based Franklin Furnace, Printed Matter and Something Else Press, were
established during this period to provide a forum for artists excluded from the
traditional institutions of the gallery and the museum. Artists’ books played an
extremely important part in the rise of these independent art structures and publishing
ventures. 4 Indeed, for many artists such books embodied the ideal of being able to
control all aspects of their work.
Yet this movement toward liberating themselves from the gallery system by
publishing and exhibiting in artists’ books was by no means an easy transition for
many artists to make. It required them to come to terms with the idea that publishing
their own work did not amount to mere vanity self-publishing, in particular. Moore
and Hendricks describe this state of affairs in terms of the power and potential of ‘the
3
Lucy R. Lippard, ‘The Artist’s Book Goes Public’, in Joan Lyons (ed), Artists’ Books: a
Critical Anthology and Sourcebook, Rochester, New York: Visual Studies Workshop Press,
1993, p45.
4
Joan Lyons, ‘Introduction’, in Lyons (ed), Artists’ Books, p7.
6
page as an alternative space’. 5 From this perspective, producing, publishing and
distributing one’s own artist’s book was a sign of autonomy and independence; it was
nothing less than a way of being able to affect society directly. 6 The political potential
associated with the book by artists should therefore not be underestimated..
Accordingly, many artists created their own publishing imprints or worked together
with newly founded artist’s book publishers and printers (just as some academics are
today challenging the increasingly profit-driven publishing industry by establishing
not-for-profit, scholar-led, open access journals and presses). The main goal of these
independent (and often non-commercial) publisher-printer-artist collectives was to
make experimental, innovative work (rather than generate a profit), and to promote
ephemeral art works, which were often ignored by mainstream, mostly marketorientated institutions. 7 Artists’ books thus fitted in well with the mythology Johanna
Drucker describes as surrounding ‘activist artists’, and especially with the idea of the
book as a tool of independent activist thought. 8
2) The Relationship with Conceptual and Processual Art
In the context of this history of the artist’s book, one particularly significant
conceptual challenge to the gallery system came with the use of the book as a
platform for exhibiting original work (itself an extension of André Malraux’s idea of
the museum without walls). Curator Seth Siegelaub was among the first to publish his
artists – as opposed to exhibiting them – thus becoming, according to Germano
5
Hendricks and Moore, ‘The Page as Alternative Space: 1950 to 1969’, in Lyons (ed),
Artists’ Books, p87.
6
Pavel Büchler, ‘Books as Books’, in Jane Rolo and Ian Hunt (eds), Book Works: a Partial
History and Sourcebook, London: Book Works, 1996.
7
Clive Phillpot, ‘Some Contemporary Artists and Their Books’, in Cornelia Lauf and Clive
Phillpot (eds), Artist/Author: Contemporary Artists’ Books, New York, Distributed Art
Publishers, 1998, pp128-9.
8
Drucker, The Century of Artists’ Books, pp7-8.
7
Celant, ‘the first to allow complete operative and informative liberty to artists’. 9 The
Xerox Book and March 1-31, 1969, featuring work by Sol LeWitt, Robert Barry,
Douglas Huebler, Joseph Kosuth, Lawrence Weiner and other international artists, are
both examples of artists’ books where the book (or the catalogue) itself is the
exhibition. As Moore and Hendricks point out, this offered all kinds of benefits when
compared with traditional exhibitions: ‘This book is the exhibition, easily
transportable without the need for expensive physical space, insurance, endless
technical problems or other impediments. In this form it is relatively permanent and,
fifteen years later, is still being seen by the public.’ 10 Artists’ books thus served here
as an alternative space in themselves and at the same time functioned within a
network of alternative spaces, such as the above-mentioned Franklin Furnace
and Printed Matter.. Next to publishing and supporting artists’ books, such venues
offered a space for staging often highly politicised, critical, experimental and
performance art. 11 It is important to emphasise this aspect of artist book publishing, as
it shows that the book was used as a specific medium to exhibit works that could not
otherwise readily find a place within mainstream exhibition venues (a situation which,
as we will show, has been one of the main driving forces behind open access book
publishing). This focus on the book as a place for continual experimentation – be it on
the level of content or form – can thus be seen as underpinning what we are referring
to here as the ‘political nature of the book’ (playing on the title of Adrian Johns’
classic work of book history). 12
9
Germano Celant, Book as Artwork 1960-1972, New York, 6 Decades Books, 2011, p40.
Hendricks and Moore, ‘The Page as Alternative Space. 1950 to 1969’, p94.
11
Brian Wallis, ‘The Artist’s Book and Postmodernism’, in Cornelia Lauf and Clive Phillpot,
(eds), Artist/Author, 1998.
12
Adrian Johns, The Nature of the Book: Print and Knowledge in the Making, Chicago,
University of Chicago Press, 1998.
10
8
3) The Use of Accessible Technologies
As is the case with the current changes to the scholarly monograph, the rise of artists’
books can be perceived to have been underpinned (though by no means determined)
by developments in technology, with the revolution in mimeograph and offset
printing helping to take artists’ books out of the realm of expensive and rare
commodities by providing direct access to quick and inexpensive printing
methods. 13 Due to its unique characteristics – low production costs, portability,
accessibility and endurance – the artist’s book was regarded as having the potential to
communicate with a wider audience beyond the traditional art world. In particular, it
was seen as having the power to break down the barriers between so-called high and
low culture, using the techniques of mass media to enable artists to argue for their
own,
alternative
goals,
something
that
presented
all
kinds
of
political
possibilities.14 The artist’s book thus conveyed a high degree of artistic autonomy,
while also offering a far greater role to the reader or viewer, who was now able to
interact with the art object directly (eluding the intermediaries of the gallery and
museum system). Indeed, Lippard even went so far as to envision a future where
artists’ books would be readily available as part of mass consumer culture, at
‘supermarkets, drugstores and airports’. 15
4) The Politics of the Democratic Multiple
13
Hendricks and Moore, ‘The Page as Alternative Space’, pp94-95.
Joan Lyons, ‘Introduction’, in Lyons (ed), Artists’ Books, p7.
15
Lippard, ‘The Artist’s Book Goes Public’, p48; Lippard, ‘Conspicuous Consumption: New
Artists’ Books’, in Lyons (ed), Artists’ Books, p100. Is there a contradiction here between a
politics of artists’ books that is directed against commercial profit-driven galleries and
institutions, but which nevertheless uses the tools of mass consumer culture to reach a wider
audience (see also the critique Lippard offers in the next section)? And can a similar point be
made with respect to the politics of some open access initiatives and their use of social media
and (commercial, profit-driven) platforms such as Google Books and Amazon?
14
9
The idea of the book as a real democratic multiple came into being only after 1945, a
state of events that has been facilitated by a number of technological innovations,
including those detailed above. Yet the conce
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