From Nancy Bell Scott - Hint - The Other Side

[cheryl penn]

I KNOW altered books - they're my 'thing' - Nancy could not have chosen a better medium to send me.  It is interesting that she imposed collages and asemic writing on pages of pre-written text, torn from their original moorings  - I mean -  this page is already written. It HAD meaning. It was an insular world, a concluded entity. 

And Nancy changed its meaning, its context and made a palimpsest. A palimpsest of thread, text, paint, shapes and asemics. She changed the intrinsic nature of the text. Thats the point of collage - right? To take fragments of a new world and impose them on an old in order to create new textual and visual images?  But, successful work is not fragmented. It is well integrated and co-hesive. It has pleasing composition and successful tonal value - like Nancy's. If I were this author, I would be REALLY pleased that my book came loose from its anchors, was removed from the morass of popular publications, travelled the world and wound finally up as a work of art. 

The Other Side of What? Post Literacy? I'll leave you to decide. thanks Nancy - a FAB for sure :-) X

[Nancy Bell Scott]

How beautifully expressed, Cheryl, really. They do seem very happy, living in the studio, waiting for their continuation, waiting for attention. While running my little antiques shop, I'd go to auction and buy big boxes of books that no one wanted for five bucks, many in various stages of disrepair. I thought they were wonderful, letting their history show. Most would sit in the shop book corner, though, and not get bought. A few did, but not many. At first, after a year or so, I'd donate them to the Hospice bookstore here, but guess what I discovered upon going back there? A few would be put on their shelves for sale, but most were in the recycling bin! Even ones that didn't have that much wrong with them but that the Hospice people knew buyers would not be interested in. That's when I decided to "recycle" them myself. One book goes a long way with me. I haven't had to buy any at all since closing the shop five years ago. These are the ones that were left, that no one wanted even when they were priced at 10 cents for over two months at pre-closing time. I'm glad Cheryl helped you to rethink this, Katerina. :--)

[Katerina Nikoltsou (MomKat)]

OK... that's it, next time i am in the city and get to that little ol' basement thrift/junk/old books place, I shall "sud suet" hug a few of those sad books, choose a few, and bring them home to make-them-sing! What a beautiful idea, Cheryl!

[cheryl penn]

Books sit being unloved and all alone, old and faded on shelves, unloved by anyone.  They will NEVER be read again. They get sad. To be remade, to be CHOSEN to become an artwork - I can hear them singing :-) X

[Katerina Nikoltsou (MomKat)]

Hmmmm, rethinking, thanks Nancy. If I see a falling-apart-book, a half-missing-the-pages book, I could alter it. That is possible. And I see how it can then get a "new life" as part of art. Ya got me thinking.... thanks.

[Nancy Bell Scott]

There's the title!  I knew someone would come up with it!  Nice going, Cheryl.

[cheryl penn]

I am JUST looking at this right now again - the actual work :-) - Cosmic Collage Clash :-))) X

[Nancy Bell Scott]

But Katerina, that's exactly why it can be easy to use parts of falling-apart books:  when I do that, it feels like giving it new life -- rescuing it from the eventual trash bin that someone would toss it into. You're right, it does have value no matter what the condition, and giving it new life expresses how worthwhile it is to keep it going. That's my take on it, anyway. Many thanks for your appreciation of this particular work!

[Katerina Nikoltsou (MomKat)]

Tis a beauty, Nancy! Bravo! Sorry  I missed this blog in the past days of blog-bombardments). As Cheryl says it is παλίμψηστο χειρόγραφο. Love the layers of threads, papers, text...wow. You and Cheryl, and many others do "altered books", I know, but I have not been able to take the "leap" and cut up/ tear up a book...even an old-thrift-store-used-tattered book of "no value". To me a book, every book, has "worth", so can't altered one, yet. I do have an abundant supply of "asemic" Greek newspaper and magazine texts, sooooo have-text-will-palimpsest....(παλίμψηστο - it's Greek to me ;-)

[Nancy Bell Scott]

Yah, you've got an apt description there of the collage-condition diagnosis, Cheryl.  You hit it dead center.  Too bad, eh?  Naw, don't we mostly love being down with this disease.  I do, thanks to all.  And Marie, you tend to be extra observant, don't you!  You called out exactly what went on in my mind.

[Marie Wintzer]

Great blog Cheryl! And what a wonderfully dense work. I like how she uses asemic writing a little bit like stitches holding everything together. On the first picture for example, the writing that connects the torn pages, like a bridge.