Presentation over content
Andrew Lambirth
The partnership between the written word and the visual image has a long and distinguished history. Leaving aside the pictographic tradition and the fertile area of calligraphy, the first artists’ books must date from the modern period when artists began to grow ever more independent and self-confident. Although it could never be said that Leonardo or Piero della Francesca lacked self-confidence, it should be remembered that they functioned within a culture which recognised the position of artists primarily as craftsmen who were employed to fulfil a need — mostly in the domain of religious imagery, and increasingly in that of secular portraiture. Artists were not then paid to indulge themselves in orgies of self-expression. There was a Madonna to be painted or a rich patron to be portrayed. If artists wrote books, they tended to be quasi-scientific investigations of optics or mathematics or anatomy. They were not journals of personal achievement or thoughts about Life.
Of course, there was the separate category of the illustrated book, and hand-painted manuscripts had become precious and much-sought-after during the Middle Ages. The Gothic Books of Hours were perhaps the apogee of this art form, and we know that some painters (such as Mantegna and Botticelli) also dabbled in this form of illumination, though it was largely replaced in the 16th century by the new processes of mechanical printing which could replicate images via woodcut or engraving. These sorts of illustration were the forefathers of today’s illustrated books — an artist responding to a text by someone else, often poetry or fiction. These days there are few artists who successfully combine illustration and fine art — Peter Blake is a prime example, with such distinguished talents as Leonard Rosoman and the late John Ward working as devotedly in both disciplines though with less public profile — while most books that require illustrations are the province of graphic designers or professional illustrators.
The illustrated book has occasionally been a focus for some of Europe’s greatest artists, particularly the French, as witnessed by the ‘livre d’artiste’ tradition. In these collaborations, an enterprising publisher would bring together an artist who liked literature with a piece of writing susceptible to visual interpretation, and hope for the best. Some remarkable works of art have resulted. But there have always been those artists who didn’t want their work tied to anyone else’s words, and either made a book solely of images, or else wrote the words themselves. (The unsullied purity of the idea or the ultimate self-indulgence?) From there it was but a step to the contemporary artist’s book, in which the form of the book itself has been brought into question, and books are made from bricks or plastic or fur or matches, or whatever takes your fancy (if you’re an artist, or rather a book-artist). In the artistic free-for-all that exists today, the book has become just another object, a form of sculpture, that only occasionally resorts to employing text.
I think that’s a pity, since I am a writer who loves both art and books, and who takes delight in the discovery of a new combination of text and image that has the power to move me. I love innovation, but I am enough of a traditionalist to prefer the use of paper and some form of practical container (if not a standard binding) to keep the book together. I have worked with a couple of artists to make such books (my texts, their images), and copies of these publications are now in public collections such as the Tate and the V&A libraries. So it was with some excitement that I greeted the news of a major exhibition at the V&A called Blood on Paper: The Art of the Book (showing until 29 June).
Displayed in rooms off the main hall (Cromwell Road entrance), the exhibition is an unrestful installation, with hundreds of projected white and red words jostling each other on the upper walls. This digital light projection is by Charles Sandison, and it’s matched by an underwater soundtrack by that master of ambient music, Brian Eno. (I remember how his lacklustre soundscapes used to be collectively known as ‘music for lavatories’.) The visitor is greeted by a lead book by Anselm Kiefer, its leaves akimbo. Various flat cabinets are set around the walls containing such classics as Matisse’s ‘Jazz’, Picasso’s ‘Deux Contes’ (both 1947) and Giacometti’s ‘Paris sans Fin’ (1969). The last was not completed before the artist’s death in 1966, and was published posthumously. It seems to have set a dangerous precedent.
This exhibition has been jointly curated by Rowan Watson from the V&A and Elena Foster, founder and director of Ivory Press, a commercial venture. Collaboration between a museum and commerce inevitably affects the impartiality of any survey, and introduces a conflict of interests. Only 40 per cent of the exhibits come from the V&A’s own marvellous collection (the National Art Library). Out of a total of 60 exhibits by 38 artists, nine works are on loan from Ivory Press, which include a suitcase of replicas from Francis Bacon’s studio. This can hardly be said to be an artist’s book, however far you stretch the definition. Bacon would have laughed himself hoarse. A selection of the detritus from his studio floor has been collected and replicated in a limited edition. Interesting as research material, perhaps, though I don’t think the average researcher would be able to afford it. It’s really a kind of posthumous artistic tuft-hunting, souvenirs for the wealthy. Then there’s a Noguchi book from Ivory Press which is also posthumous — a set of facsimile photographs. Another facsimile production from Ivory Press is a big boxed effort of Chillida’s drawings. The original concept was Chillida’s but it was executed after his death.
To me these productions don’t feel like real artists’ books. For the authentic frisson, I turned to Robert Motherwell’s illustrations for Three Poems by Octavio Paz. ‘Wind/on the dusty corners/turns the papers/Yesterday’s news... ’ There were experimental things by Anish Kapoor that looked like slits, and a childish installation of plaster snowballs thrown at the wall by a sculptor who calls himself (rather appropriately) Not Vital. I preferred to look at the real books by Dubuffet and Sam Francis, the Rauschenberg illustrations for RobbeGrillet, Sol LeWitt’s minimalism and Ed Ruscha’s famous books of Gas Stations and Swimming Pools. Even Richard Long’s mud handprints (1984, Coracle Press) held more interest. The catalogue is a big limited-edition box published by Ivory Press (£45), filled with reproductions on different coloured card. Like the exhibition, it’s a dismal triumph of presentation over content. Surely the V&A can do better than this? A proper selection of artists’ books from its own first-rate collection would be a start.
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