“Familiar Relics” is here

The pleasure of your company is requested at the opening and reception for Familiar Relics, 6:30-8:30,  Brownlee O.  Currey, Jr.  Gallery, Watkins College of  Art, Design & Film, 2298 Rosa L. Parks Blvd, Nashville, TN.

jump jive is alive

Balancing the cool heat of Familiar Relics will be the sweltering cool of Eight O’ Five Jive playing to beat the band at the opening reception on October 5, 6:30-8:30, in the Brownlee O. Currey, Jr. Gallery at Watkins College of Art, Design & Film, 2298 Rosa L. Parks Boulevard, Nashville. Take a listen, then, come take a look.

Vendors for H&BN vol. 2

Our list of Vendors just keeps growing. With participants ranging from EraBellum, an artisan co-op freshly opened September 1, through bookstores like East Side Story, community projects like Chicago’s North Branch Projects to the book artists of Brown Dog Bindery and Linenlaid & felt, we cover the range of things bookish.  Check out the whole list through the link on our Vendors page.  Even better reserve a table and join us at Handmade&Bound Nashville, October 6 in Nashville.

King-Cat or cat king?

John Porcellino

John Porcellino is bringing King-Cat and his catalog of mini-comics, comics, and graphic novels to Handmade & Bound Nashville. His celebrated self-published series King-Cat Comics, begun in 1989, has inspired a generation of cartoonists. Diary of a Mosquito Abatement Man, a collection of King-Cat stories about Porcellino’s experiences as a pest control worker, won an Ignatz Award in 2005, and Perfect Example, first published in 2000, chronicles his struggles with depression as a teenager.  King-Cat Classix and Map of My Heart, published in 2007/2009, offer a comprehensive overview of the zine’s first sixty-one issues, while Thoreau at Walden (2008) is a poetic expression of the great philosopher’s experience and ideals. According to cartoonist Chris Ware, “John Porcellino’s comics distill, in just a few lines and words, the feeling of simply being alive.” Come see for yourself, October 6, 2012 at Handmade & Bound Nashville, vol. 2

Support your local bookmaker

Esther’s Diary- S.S. Atlantic March 25, 1952
by Claudia Lee

The list of vendors for handmade books, book arts, and book related products coming to Handmade & Bound Nashville v. 2 continues to grow.  Whether returning friends like Claudia Lee from Liberty Paper Mill or fresh acquaintances like Thistle Farms with their fine handmade products, there will be a variety of affordable book art pieces, book crafts, paper and book making supplies, and lots of goodies that those who love books will love.

Check out our Vendors page for details on how to reserve space to sell your book wares.  There is space still available including, weather permitting, tables outside and inside.

Join us on October 6 for demonstrations, food, and a celebration of all things bookish, Handmade & Bound Nashville v.2.

Build a world of books

Miler Lagos- “Pie de Amigo” (photo courtesy of IntoForm)

Join local book artists and book enthusiasts on October 4, 2012 for Handmade & Bound Nashville’s premier community book sculpture project. Volunteers needed to sort books, participate in the construction of the sculpture {power tool tutorial available} or just cheer on us busy worker bees as we build a spiral staircase filled with book people. You can’t build a wall without bricks and we need bricks, in this case hard back books seeking a new life as art objects. Bring your donation of hard bound books to Watkins College of Art, Design and Film Library, 2298 Rosa Park Blvd, Nashville, Tennessee. The sculpture will remain on display at Watkins College of Art, Design & Film throughout the month of October. This is your opportunity to participate in a public work of art! This is a walk up event, come by anytime during the day.

Are those books?

"Merck's Manual" by Elizabeth M. Claffey

Portland, Oregon’s 23 Sandy Gallery is celebrating Portland Photo Month with Interplay: Photographers Focus on the Book, an exhibit of artist books created by four photographers, Elizabeth M. Claffey, Lauren Henkin, Clifton Meador and Laura Russell.  The exhibit opens April 6 and features works using a range of techniques inculding, in the Gallery’s words, “fine bindings to altered books, to print on demand books and pop ups, this show is an exploration of the crossover between the art of photography and the art of the book. Each of the four artists use the book form to push beyond the two-dimensional limits of the photographic medium by melding their photos into art in the form of a book.”

"52" by Clifton Meador

These artists expand the concept of the book with explorations of content, form, process, and intention.  Whether in Claffey’s superimposition of photograph on type or Meador’s self-imposed limit of creating a book a week for a year, these works promise to deliver the visual, intellectual, tactile, and emotional experience that is a book.