As the battle for dominance in the war of the electronic reader heats up, it's heartening to attend an event entirely devoted to the possibilities of printed matter. The NY Art Book Fair, which moved out to P. S. 1 in Queens from its usual Manhattan quarters, featured more than 200 presses, publishers, and dealers from around the world. Lots of great stuff, though it only makes me wish for a regular exhibition space for books among the myriad art galleries in NYC. Remember MoMA's brilliant "The Russian Avant-Garde Book" so many years ago?
Speaking of Russians, the aptly named Lubok, a German publisher of "picture books," featured some of the most luscious examples of book art: gorgeous special-editions by Volker Pfüller and Katja Schwalenberg. Both consist of linocuts composed of vivid, velvety colors. These, from Schwalenberg's book.
It's a shame that Schwalenberg's Frau Wow, a book that won a Red Dot award for design in 2005, hasn't been published in the US. It's almost wordless, so it wouldn't require much in the way of translation. In 21 chapters, Schwalenberg employs a wide variety of media and styles to examine the many facets of being a woman—you know, harness racer, coquette, S & M goddess. The book's pages are awash with nuggets from twentieth-century art--Philip Guston, Martha Rosler, Jacob Lawrence, Gary Hume. Did I mention it comes with 3-D glasses?
I also snagged this postcard from the Lubok booth.
I think I look like this a lot, minus the hat.
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What? You don't like hats?
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