A HEMLINE OF SKY, FOREST, AND WATER THROUGH SMOKE
“…. the animals confer that it will happen.”
Gracia Haby & Louise Jennison
A Hemline of Sky Through Smoke
A Hemline of Forest Through Smoke
and
A Hemline of Water Through Smoke
2020
Unopened artists’ books, 12 double-sided Indigo Digital CMYK pages with perforated fore-edge and eight double-sided Indigo Digital CMYK and black pages on 118gsm Mohawk Superfine Smooth Ultra White, with Indigo Digital CMYK covers on 148gsm Mohawk Superfine Smooth Ultra White
Including a waistband on 118gsm Mohawk Superfine Smooth Ultra White, and paper knife on 1400gsm boxboard
Printed by Bambra
Bound by Louise Jennison
(Each an) edition of 100, with 10 artists’ proofs
The [artists’ books] began with a picture which began with a catastrophe.
[From fire service updates and images and videos posted from on-the-ground and at-the-scene in a still-ongoing-at-the-time-of-publication series of bushfires, read on twitter in the summer of 2019–20, assembled under the hashtags #AustraliaBurns and #ClimateCrisis. At the time of making these artists’ books,] the full impact on tree species and wildlife will not be known until more assessments are done as fire grounds become accessible. This is climate change in its most fundamental form.
[Collages pulled from] the snare of words [read at the time, and belonging to other people, in news articles, and a collection of books on the bedside table].
[From] foreign syntax.
I'm a grey and blue landscape. An assemblage of disparate scenes.
All the plants and algae, bacteria, invertebrates, fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds, mammals.
…. the animals confer that it will happen.
…. a range of harsh screeches and metallic whistles.
…. the moment of crisis has come.
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RELATED LINKS,
A HEMLINE OF SMOKE CATALOGUE PDF
#AHEMLINEOFSMOKE
2020 LIBRIS AWARDS: THE AUSTRALIAN ARTISTS BOOK PRIZE CATALOGUE PDF
A VIRTUAL TOUR OF THE 2020 LIBRIS AWARDS: THE AUSTRALIAN ARTISTS BOOK PRIZE
BAMBRA CASE STUDY: GRACIA & LOUISE
RELATED POSTS,
1, 2, 3, READY
THROUGH SMOKE
THE ANIMALS CONFER THAT IT WILL HAPPEN
IF YOU WANT TO READ THIS BOOK, YOU’LL NEED TO OPEN IT
SMOKE
LEAF THROUGH
THE MOUNTAINS ARE CALLING…
SILVERED
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A Hemline of Sky Through Smoke, A Hemline of Forest Through Smoke, and A Hemline of Water Through Smoke refer to a line by Larry Levis, “A hemline of smoke, sky, & a serene indifference?”, from his poem ‘To a Wren on Calvary’[i].
Because through action comes hope, we’ve created a series of artists’ books to nestle beneath this line. Artists’ book which require the reader to take action in order to see the full collage clearly. The reader will need to tear open the perforated fore-edge of each page spread to see through the smoke, to see what lies beneath, or ahead, or in the past. Echoing Sir David Attenborough’s words that “If we don’t take action, the collapse of our civilizations and the extinction of much of the natural world is on the horizon”[ii], without action, all will be lost.
The hemline of smoke is both a representation of bushfire smoke caused by the megafires of the last four months, and a reference to the disappearance of our natural world due to land clearing, species extinctions, and the climate change emergency.
From the critically endangered Swift parrot (Lathamus discolor) to the vulnerable Long-nosed potoroo (Potorous tridactylus), and with Australia’s woeful conservation track record[ii], all of the species within these pages were once common, where they were observed and drawn.
Within the pages, through the smoke, you can see stage sets by Eugène Cicéri (1813–1890), from The Elisha Whittelsey Collection in The Metropolitan Museum of Art; and from the digital archives of State Library Victoria and National Library of Australia, Australian birds from the Port Phillip District of NSW, from the sketchbook of John Cotton, and illustrations by Harriett Scott and Helena Forde from The Mammals of Australia (Sydney: Government Printer, 1871).
Featured within the 300+ digital layers, engravings by James Sowerby from Zoology and botany of New Holland and the isles adjacent (London: J. Sowerby, 1794); and Sarah Stone from Journal of a Voyage to New South Wales: With Sixty-five Plates of Non Descript Animals, Birds, Lizards, Serpents, Curious Cones of Trees and Other Natural Productions (London: J. Debrett, 1790); alongside those accessed via the digital collections of Biodiversity Heritage Library and the Rijksmuseum. These early European depictions of Australian natural history are common to our own memory bank. These hand-coloured observations of our trespass, a reflection about history and memory — from where we have come, where we now are, and where we are headed — as descendants of the colonisers.
Available individually, or as a set held together by a waistband with a paper opener, we will be donating 5% of each sale to Bush Heritage Australia, to help protect that which inspired the work. Bush Heritage Australia is an “independent not-for-profit that buys and manages land, and also partners with Aboriginal people, to conserve our magnificent landscapes and our irreplaceable native species forever” (Bush Heritage Australia).
We launched these artists’ books from our stall at the 2020 NGV Melbourne Art Book Fair.
We are delighted that full sets were acquired by National Library of Australia, State Library New South Wales, State Library Victoria, University of Melbourne’s Baillieu Library, and the University of West England.
Edition set 75/100 was shortlisted in the 2020 Libris Awards: The Australian Artists Book Prize at Artspace Mackay. Artspace Mackay invite you to take a virtual tour of the 2020 Libris Awards: The Australian Artists Book Prize, in which you will find our set of artists’ books, A Hemline of Sky, Forest, and Water Through Smoke.
A set was also exhibited in the Bower Ashton Library cases, UWE, Bristol, as part of our Remote Residency in November, 2020, and as part of the exhibition The Mountains Are Calling…, in 2023, to accompany the UWE / LAND2 symposium discussing environmental themes including water quality, land degradation, pollution and damage to the landscape, interventions and ideas.
NOTES:
[i] Larry Levis, ‘To a Wren on Calvary’, The Widening Spell of the Leaves (Pennsylvania: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1991).
[ii] David Wallace-Wells, ‘Time to Panic: The planet is getting warmer in catastrophic ways. And fear may be the only thing that saves us’, The New York Times, 16th February 2019, accessed December 2019.
[iii] Chief Climate Councillor, Professor Tim Flannery, ‘New Report: Unique Aussie wildlife threatened by climate change’, Climate Council, 17th September 2019, accessed December 2019.
In October 2020, we donated a set of A Hemline of Sky, Forest, and Water Through Smoke to the RMIT OpenBite Print Auction to support the Print students’ graduate exhibition and student scholarships.
Artists’ Books Exhibitions in the Bower Ashton Library showcases, UWE, Bristol, UK
The Mountains Are Calling…
Friday 3rd March – Monday 17th April, 2023
A selection of artists’ books by members of LAND2 and from the archives at the Centre for Print Research.
Bower Ashton Library, UWE Bristol City Campus, Kennel Lodge Road, Bristol BS3 2JT, UK
Newsletter for March – mid April 2023, issue 152, pages 2–4
This exhibition accompanies a Bookarts at UWE / LAND2 symposium in Bristol discussing environmental themes including water quality, land degradation, pollution and damage to the landscape, interventions and ideas. It shares some of the outcomes from UWE’s HAS-ACE Connecting Research Project Grant Scheme — Slow Violence and River Abuse: The Hidden Effect of Land Use on Water Quality (led by Niamh Fahy and Gillian Clayton) — alongside curated presentations from national artists, geographers, writers, environmentalists and scientists. The creative practice-led research network LAND2, “land squared”, was started in 2002 as a national network of artist/lecturers and research students with an interest in landscape/place-oriented art practice. Its convenors are: Iain Biggs (independent), Mary Modeen (Dundee) and Judith Tucker (University of Leeds).
The artists’ books on display at Bower Ashton Library have been selected for their focus on the natural world and the environment in relation to the project’s themes. A popup handling exhibition of prints and artists’ books will temporarily leave the library for the public to handle at the UWE / LAND2 day event.
Artists’ books on display include:
Semáforo volcánico (volcanic traffic light), Ireri Topete (Mexico), 2021. A large-scale artist's book dedicated to the Popocatepelt volcano, one of the most active volcanoes in Mexico. The book is from Topete's Termómetos project, (a catalogue of the works prduced can be viewed on ISSUU *3) is a visual record of nature and its changes. “The artists’ books made in concertina format, bear witness to the events observed, as visual scales. This series is based on the observation, investigation and recording of real events that occurred during the year 2019, this year being particularly extraordinary in terms of natural phenomena, which occurred in an atypical way. 2019, turned out to be an especially significant year globally, natural events have skyrocketed in their intensity, frequency and repercussions for the natural environment and human settlements.”[i]
Escrituras Tangibles, Ioulia Akhmadeeva, (Mexico) 2020. (One piece from the project). This project consists of the installation of an artist’s book in a different format: multiple printed textiles and objects in one space. The topic is Existence, Survival, and Habitat. Mini poems in the form of haikus in calligraphic engraving and printed texts. They talk about solitude, life, nature, rain, pandemic times, moments of life, garden, and light. Mediums and techniques: linoleum engravings printed in linen on both sides.
The piece is composed of 250 linen clouds-poems, from which a rain of satin and organza ribbons fall to meet with 250 rocks with poetry in Spanish, English and Russian. The 1000 ribbons have words and haikus printed on them with rubber stamps.[ii]
Non-description of the Hill, Radosław Nowakowski (Poland), 1999. “Mountain, you’ve hidden yourself behind the labyrinth of the leafless tree, got lost in the misty air. But I do have almost one hundred pictures taken from the same place, in different parts of a day and of a year. I will turn these pictures into subtle prints, cover them with unclear tales small as little clouds, tales about everything and nothing, written in three languages… And somebody wishing to see you will have to open noisily the paper window and go through it to the text or through the text to the picture or through the picture to the picture or through the text to the text…
What do I make it for? This idea is so common among masters and fakers. But nobody has done it with this mountain. From this place. In this place.”[iii]
Minidewak, Robin Wall Kimmerer (USA), 2013. “As a botanist and professor of plant ecology, Robin Wall Kimmerer has spent a career learning how to ask questions of nature using the tools of science. As a Potawatomi woman, she learned from elders, family, and history that the Potawatomi consider plants and animals to be our oldest teachers. MCBA’s Winter Book Minidewak in partnership with Milkweed Editions, reproduced four selected readings from Kimmerer’s book of essays Braiding Sweetgrass in a limited edition, handmade artist’s book in 2013.
A Potawatomi term, minidewak (literally, “they give from the heart”) refers to a ceremonial tradition of gift-giving, an expression of generosity and gratitude with its roots in nature’s cycle of plenty and scarcity. Kimmerer understands the minidewak as a living symbol of community, wherein “the well-being of one is linked to the well-being of all.”[iv]
Plasticarium Prospectus, Sally Alatalo (USA), 2021. “In response to the material ubiquity of synthetic polymers, including their molecular integration into the earth’s bio-stream, Plasticarium Prospectus imagines a repository modelled on collection, classification and research strategies represented in museums, herbaria, libraries and other archives.”[v]
A hemline of sky, forest, and water through smoke, Gracia Haby and Louise Jennison (Australia), 2020. The artists’ books began with a picture which began with a catastrophe.
“[From fire service updates and images and videos posted from on-the-ground and at-the-scene in a still-ongoing-at-the-time-of-publication series of bushfires, read on twitter in the summer of 2019–20, assembled under the hashtags #AustraliaBurns and #ClimateCrisis. At the time of making these artists’ books,] the full impact on tree species and wildlife will not be known until more assessments are done as fire grounds become accessible. This is climate change in its most fundamental form.
[Collages pulled from] the snare of words [read at the time, and belonging to other people, in news articles, and a collection of books on the bedside table].
[From] foreign syntax.
I'm a grey and blue landscape. An assemblage of disparate scenes.
All the plants and algae, bacteria, invertebrates, fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds, mammals.
…. the animals confer that it will happen.
…. a range of harsh screeches and metallic whistles.
…. the moment of crisis has come.[vi]
This Place (Volumes 1–6), Angie Butler/ABPress (UK), 2014–2016. Each pamphlet captures a fleeting experience or a glimpse; a pocket-sized memory of being here, tempting others to imagine. Made whilst on a residency at Deuchar Mill (Helen Douglas Weproductions), Yarrow, housed in wooden slipcase.
Outfalls, Judith Tucker & Harriet Tarlo (UK) 2018. “Outfalls is a collaboration between Judith Tucker (drawings) and Harriet Tarlo (texts) reflecting on the life of the Louth Navigation in North East Lincolnshire, published by Wild Pansy Press. They first encountered the canal at its outfall at Tetney Haven on the Humber Estuary. From here they traced the canal back to Louth and became fascinated in its past, present and future, the people who live there, and its blend of natural and cultural features which, in microcosm, reflect many global and national issues related to place, environment and heritage.”[vii]
You can read more about the exhibition and see the full list of artists’ books on show on the Bookarts website. Find out more about LAND2 at: https://land2.leeds.ac.uk
[i] https://issuu.com/tirerica/docs/okok_proyecto_ termometros_2.2_med [ii] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRAmbLsEw1A&t=4s
[iii] https://www.liberatorium.com/books/gora/hill.html
[iv] https://www.mnbookarts.org/minidewak-2013/
[v] http://www.sallyalatalo.com/plasticarium-prospectus/
[vi] https://gracialouise.com/works/hemline
[vii] http://www.wildpansypress.com/index.php/publications/works-by-harriet-tarlo--judith-tucker/
This exhibition is free and open to the public at Bower Ashton Library, Monday – Friday, 9am–5pm. No booking needed. The library is on the first floor of B block.
Book Arts
