LOCATING A TEXTILE WREN (AMYTIS TEXTILIS) WITHIN VOLUMES

Recently landed: Locating a Textile wren (Amytis textilis) within volumes

Earlier in the year, you may recall, we had the opportunity to see the beautiful source material, which frond by wing we have woven into our artists’ books.
Seeing these jewel-like, original works spring and quiver with our own eyes was a particular pleasure, having previously worked with the back-lit digital files at home. There, on the one table, meeting for the first time, it was a rare thrill to see Silvester Diggles’s powder soft Superb lyrebird (Menura superba) from Ornithology of Australia alongside our artists’ book Something reverberated. To peer closely at the sprig of — so appealing! so luminous! you can almost nibble them! — Grevillea banksii, from the Illustrated botanical works by Ferdinandi Bauer within Novae Hollandiae. To locate engraved boughs by James Sowerby of Eucalyptus robusta and Styphelia tubiflora, both of which grow in With wings outstretched and quivering. Time spent deducing which Lyrebird is that, the Diggles, the Broinowski, the Gould? is time always well spent.

Continuing reading on Marginalia.

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8th of July, 2024

To our great delight, both With Wings Outstretched and Quivering, and its hand-painted box, and Something Reverberated, and its box, shown alongside a related zine of the same title, are currently on display alongside some of the exquisitely beautiful source material, as part of the Contemporary Victorian Artists display, Inspired by the Collection, as part of World of the Book at State Library Victoria.