Betty Bright, No Longer Innocent: Book Art in America, 1960 to 1980, 2005. 7" x 10", 350 pp. No Longer Innocent: Book Art in America:1960–1980 is the first history to trace the emergence of the artist's book in the U.S. during the 1960s and 1970s. This history takes a inclusive view of the varied field of book art and redresses the sporadic or confused acknowledgment from the art world that has long marginalized the artist's book. The book identifies European precursors of these kinds of artists' books, then quickly moves to America with the development of artists and books and non-profit organization. No Longer Innocent also addresses the ways book art affected and responded to art movements, such as Pop, Fluxus or Conceptualism. The book's inclusive approach suggests that it will appeal to a broad audience, from collectors of fine press books and deluxe books, to artists making multiple and sculptural bookworks, to cultural historians, librarians and booklovers interested in the phenomenon of the persistence of the book metaphor. Teachers in higher education with a broad view of the field's beginnings will find this book useful for classes in American studies and art history, as well as studio arts classes in printmaking, photography and sculpture. ISBN:1-887123-71-7, $39.95 (U.S.).

Norma Cole, Collective Memory, Poetry Center & Granary Books, 2006. 9" x 11", 52 pp. Collective Memory originated in the context of the installation work by that name, created by Norma Cole at the California Historical Society in San Francisco. The text comprises several sections: "Prelude" is followed by "Speech Production: Themes and Variations" which is illustrated throughout with full-color photographs, by Norma Cole, presented here in the form of one inch sections resembling 35 mm contact sheet strips. This section is followed by "Collective Memory: History" which is illustrated with Cole’s line drawings and provides insight into the poet’s process of developing the installation. Another section of text (9 x 1 3/4 inches), "House of Hope" in memoriam Montien Boonma 1953-2000 is separately bound into the covers at the bottom of the book in such a way that it runs parallel to the above noted text. "House of Hope" is composed 416 quotations "notebook phrases" from a wide range of artists, poets, filmmakers, philosophers, and other writers. It references and re-produces Cole’s hanging sculpture of the same name, transformed into a new presentation for this book. Collective Memory is co-published by Granary Books, New York City and the Poetry Center, San Francisco State University. The book is designed by Emily McVarish and bound in buckram over boards by Coriander Reisbord. The letterpress portion is set in Bulmer and printed on Somerset Book by Philip Gallo at the Hermetic Press. Offset portions are set in Universe and printed on Mohawk Superfine and French Paper Company Construction. The edition comprises 48 copies of which 12 are hors commerce and 36 are for sale. $1,500.

Alison Knowles, Time Samples, 2006. 6 1/4" x 6 1/2", 33 pp.
"Taking the used silk screens apart is the place to begin. This book is to be selected leavings plus used tools of the trade, the trade of art-making." Thus begins the introduction to Time Samples. Each book contains 15 original "leavings" — 6 1/4 inch squares of archival material derived primarily from the artist’s studio — starting with a "green china silk remnant bought to act as a sun shield over the skylight" and ending with "mostly small sun-printed items like spoons and nails used to test the shade of blue possible to get, given the decay of light after its zenith at noon." In between are cut-ups, litho film, "red lentil embedments in flax," silk-screen fragments, "live body prints," "iron-on color Xeroxes of objects…" and much more. Opposite each fragment is an identifying caption as well as a section from the text "Writing Red" which is a written performance of the 1962 Fluxus event score: "Celebration Red: Celebrate every red thing." Text and material images are here plucked from the residue of a life in art. As Knowles points out in the introduction: "The irony is that fragments and leftovers, sampled by time itself, take on a new life." The work is held together and presented within an ingenious modified accordion structure, designed and produced by Katherine Kuehn, which allows Time Samples to operate as a book while also offering the possibility of being unfolded (to over 5 feet) and hung on the wall with all of the samples visible. The typography is by Anne Noonan and Steve Clay; the book was printed at Soho Letterpress. Binding by Judith Ivry. Boxes by Portfoliobox, Inc. The edition is limited to 45 copies. $2,500.

Jackson Mac Low, Doings: Assorted Performance Pieces 1955–2002, 2005. 8 1/2" x 11" 248 pp. Termed "America's most indefatigable experimental poet" by Publishers Weekly, Jackson Mac Low is considered a master innovator. This volume brings together a comprehensive collection of his performance scores written, drawn and composed over the past 40 years, complete with their accompanying instructions and commentary, providing a superb overview of these remarkable compositions. This collection presents facsimile reprints of the artist's handwritten as well as typographical scripts providing a striking graphic presence to the work; five of the works are here produced as hand-tipped gatefolds. The book contains recent work as well as substantial sections from the near legendary "Vocabulary Gathas" and includes a studio-quality CD of audio recordings, produced by Charlie Morrow, several of which are co-composed and co-performed by Mac Low together with his wife, the poet, composer, and visual artist Anne Tardos. Three years in the making the CD and book yield a treasure trove of much previously unpublished work contributing to a more complete picture of this maestro of the avant-garde. Doings features an introduction by publisher Steve Clay and a cover by British artist Ian Tyson. ISBN 1-887123-70-9, PB. $50.00.
A limited-edition hand bound edition with an original print by Tyson is also available direct from Granary Books.

Emily McVarish, Flicker, 2005. 10.125" x 8"; 48 pp, Edition of 45 of which 35 for sale. Flicker's design and production seek to embody the combinations of presence and absence that surround and consume us every day: the mold of a tenant held by an apartment's design (and of an era's beliefs by its facade), the abstraction of drivers in traffic, the simultaneous concentration and distraction of a screen watcher, the constant here-and-gone movement of a pedestrian. Flicker's text juxtaposes and intersects strains of these four figures — buildings, traffic, a watcher, and a walker – in the shared streets of a city to see if they ever add up to a whole. Flicker's pages are composed of thousands of pieces of lead type turned on their heads and printed as a solid matrix. Text occurs in the clearings of this background where type has been flipped rightside up to show its readable face. Also accommodated in the micro-grid of Flicker's pages are isolated wood letters and small duotones. The latter were printed from polymer plates of digital video stills. Further complicating relations of negative and positive space and of sequence, die-cut holes link images and texts through multiple spreads. Flicker is written, designed, and printed by Emily McVarish. The binding is by Coriander Reisbord with McVarish. $975.

Jerome Rothenberg and Susan Bee, The Burning Babe & Other Poems, 2005. 12 [h] x 9 [w] inches, 36 pages. Printed digitally on Innova smooth white 100% cotton paper using pigment inks at Silicon Gallery Fine Art Prints Ltd. in Philadelphia during the summer of 2005. Bound in printed orange cloth over boards by Judith Ivry in New York. The edition comprises 41 copies of which 25 are for sale. $3,250