Ghost Diary, by Maureen Cummins. Brooklyn, NY: Maureen Cummins, 2003. (24 copies)
The illuminated word
Special Collections celebrates artists' books
English poet and artist William Blake is often credited with creating the first artists’ books two centuries ago in volumes such as Songs of Innocence and of Experience. But even the visionary Blake might be surprised to see how his modern-day successors have built upon his “illuminations” of “Tiger, tiger, burning bright” and the like to boldly explore the possibilities of marrying text and image. As Connell Gallagher, director of Library Special Collections, retires this spring, a key legacy of his 36-year career at the University is bringing a rich and diverse resource of artists’ books to Vermont.
Even in the current digital era, books are common objects. But when you unfold a panorama of a nineteenth-century coastal town from the endpapers of Sights from a Steeple to surround Nathaniel Hawthorne’s written sketch with something like the image that inspired it, you know you are holding something extraordinary. Text and image work together, much as they do in a children’s picture book, but the material requires an adult sensibility; Sights from a Steeple is an artist’s book.
Like fine press books, artists’ books are produced in limited editions, but they go beyond the printing press to explore all the possibilities of the book as art form. Paper pages may be replaced with metal-hinged sheets of glass, as in Maureen Cummins’s Ghost Diary; or spare text on paper strips may project from a three-dimensional diamond suspended in a crescent of wood, as in Julie Chen’s World Without End. What these works share is their presentation of a single vision; each element—text, image, design, format, and materials—contributes to the unity of the finished work.
Over the past 15 years, the UVM library has acquired one of the top collections of artists’ books in the United States, thanks to the guidance of Connell Gallagher, director of Special Collections. Indeed, in many people’s minds, Gallagher is inseparable from the artists’ books collection. “The intimacy with which he knows the collection and the artists—with his head and his heart—is inspiring,” says Cameron Davis ’76, lecturer in the Art Department, one of many faculty who use the books as a teaching resource.
Circulus Sapientae, a hymn by Hildegard von Bingen with a CD sung by Anima, produced by Claire Van Vliet. Newark, Vermont: Janus Press, 2001. (120 copies)
Gallagher’s own interest in artists’ books began in Special Collections more than a decade before he became its director. As he tells it, his predecessor, John Buechler, invited Claire Van Vliet to give a talk to the Friends of Special Collections. Van Vliet, a fine printer and bookmaker, whose Janus Press is based in Newark, Vermont, intrigued and impressed Gallagher. “I wrote and told her,” he says. “She sent me a gift book.”
Van Vliet was instrumental in far more than the beginnings of Gallagher’s extensive personal collection. Her Janus Press, which celebrates its fiftieth anniversary this year, has made Newark a mecca for book artists from across the country and across the ocean. In the late 1980s, Van Vliet brought Ron King, whose Circle Press is located in London, to visit Special Collections. King carried samples. “Those were true artists’ books,” Gallagher says, “sophisticated pop-up books, and expensive.” King’s Anansi Company was one of Gallagher’s first purchases after he became director in 1989. “Then the artists’ book world was really starting to blossom,” he remembers. “Claire would send people down. I got to know a lot of artists. They would send brochures, letters, slides, or visit.”
From those early days, the Book Arts Collection has grown to some 2,700 volumes, depending, Gallagher says, on where you draw the line between fine press and artists’ books. With Van Vliet as advisor, Gallagher has concentrated on collecting the works of ten to fifteen book artists in depth. In addition to those already named, the collection has extensive holdings of works by Robin Price, based in Middletown, Connecticut, and Vermont’s other major book artist, Brian Cohen, who established Bridge Press in Westminster in 1989.
One imprint, Gefn Press, might never have existed without UVM’s collection. Gefn founder Susan Johanknecht ’77 says, “My time at UVM was pivotal to my becoming a book artist. In fact, before a class trip to the UVM Special Collections I didn’t even know that artists’ books, fine printing, or livre d’artiste existed.” Guided by David Huddle, Johanknecht studied creative writing with Hayden Carruth and bookmaking with Van Vliet. She now teaches book art at Camberwell College of Arts in London, passing on to her students, “the link between studio art practice and library special collections.”
Gerrit Gollner ’98, whose work Sponde/Daice is in the current Fleming Museum exhibit, had an experience similar to Johanknecht’s. “I remember being sent to Connie…and going through the back room to his office where artists’ books were laid out…and my eyes went wide. He started showing me things, and before I knew it, I was sitting at a table with a full cart and little white gloves.” Although she has made no other printed artists’ books, Gollner has created altered books, painting and drawing in an old Russian dictionary, for example. Her visual art is represented by the Cicognani Galerie Köln, in Cologne, Germany, where she now lives and works.
Gollner’s hand-on experience with the collection in Bailey-Howe highlights its purpose. These books are not museum pieces, rather, they are teaching tools, well-used by students and faculty. Studio Art major Lindsay Jaccom ’06 noticed and appreciated the distinction after a class visit, “It was sort of like being in a museum, but more accessible. Having access to such expensive originals was really amazing.” Gallagher estimates that ten classes use the collection each semester, including groups from St. Michael’s College and Community College of Vermont.
At UVM, faculty members such as Kathleen Schneider, Jane Kent, and Cameron Davis regularly integrate the collection into their teaching. Davis has used it to expand students’ sense of the possible with certain assignments, from creating a book in which form reflects place to works that combine the visual, text, and memory. For Kent, a book artist in her own right who has worked with authors such as Richard Ford and Susan Orlean, the collection offers, among other opportunities, the chance to consider the market and price issues of artists’ books, entree to a wider discussion of business aspects of art.
At the end of this June, Connell Gallagher will retire satisfied in the knowledge that, “I’ve chosen the right career and the right institution.” It’s no surprise, perhaps, that he won’t be going far. He’s already signed on to serve on the Library Advisory Committee and has writing projects planned on book artists Robin Price, Maureen Cummins, and Gefn Press. “Such projects need time and focus,” Gallagher says, both of which have been difficult to find amid the responsibilities of the directorship.
So, Gallagher will continue to be a familiar face in Special Collections, where he will be found seated at a table spread with wondrous works. Chances are he wouldn’t mind a look over his shoulder, but be warned. Gallagher’s enthusiasm is contagious, the collection is deep, and you’ll soon find yourself in a pair of white gloves.
Get a glimpse
Through June 5, 2006, artists’ books selections from Special Collection are on display in the Wilbur Room of the Fleming Museum.
An exhibit celebrating the 50th anniversary of Janus Press is on display at Bailey/Howe Library through April 30. The exhibit will then move to the Grolier Club, 47 East 60th Street, in New York City.
(for UVM staff)