Artists' Books

Picnic Time! Food and Artists’ Books

An exhibit in the Design Library, Summer 2016 (Please note: This is a PAST EVENT, you can view items from this exhibit by contacting the Design Library at designlibrary@uoregon.edu)

It’s picnic time! To kick off summer, the Design Library has installed a new exhibit featuring some of the unique items found in our artists’ books collection related to food.

The books in this exhibition represent a wide range of creative approaches to book arts construction and concept. Included are a book printed on paper towels, a pop-up book about a high-sugar diet, a tunnel-book about making salsa, and photo journals of the experiences of a frozen chicken and a loaf of bread. Themes include childhood, the meat industry, food history, and consumption.

This exhibition features the newest addition to the artists’ books collection: Mortal Salt by Seattle-based artist Daniel R. Smith. The narrative of this nontraditional book is a poem by Karen Finneyfrock that tells the story of Lot’s wife from the biblical story of Sodom and Gomorrah. In the story, despite warnings from God not to, Lot’s wife turns back to watch their city be destroyed and is turned into a pillar of salt. This poem is in her justifying her decision to turn back, and reprimanding Lot for not doing so. Conceptually strong in construction and format, this book gives voice to a woman who previously had none in a way that is both charming and appropriately critical.