Transforming books into objets d'art
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"Dream of Orchids"--A hanging paper sculpture created by Karen Hatzigeorgiou from an altered book. The flowers are made from the pages of the book, mounted on a wooden frame. "The idea for the wall art came about because some people look at typical altered books and are not sure how to display them," said Hatzigeorgiou. (Courtesy of Karen Hatzigeorgiou)
A page from the 1970 edition of Tom Phillip's "treated" book, "A Humament," which the artist created by coloring over select words in a second-hand Victorian novel. "Everything I've ever wanted to say, I can find in that book," said Phillips. (Courtesy of Tom Phillips)
"Birdsong"--A decorated page from an altered book called "A Cup of Sky," by California artist Karen Hatzigeorgiou. The artist challenged herself to "find" a poem in each chapter of the book, based on the chapter titles. (Courtesy of Karen Hatzigeorgiou)
"Swiss Army Book"--A unique artists' book by M. L. Van Nice, on display as part of "The Book As Art" exhibit at the National Museum of Women in the Arts. This book is modeled on the Swiss army knife, with different writing tools like a typewriter that fold out of the book. (Courtesy of the National Museum of Women )
"On a Darkling Plain"--An altered book by Sandra Jackman, on display at the Museum of Women in the Arts. The original pages contain the poem by Matthew Arnold, which the artist illustrated in 3-D images of a devastated modern-day battlefield. (Courtesy of the Museum of Women in the Arts)
"Fear"--An altered book by Karen Hatzigeorgiou, part of her "Broken Doll" series. The piece was created using a book, a discarded doll and other found items. (Courtesy of Karen Hatzigeorgiou)
The works of art in Karen Hatzigeorgiou’s studio come in wildly different shapes and sizes: a brightly painted page of poetry, a reliquary that opens to reveal a picture of a saint and a baby’s tooth in a glass vial, and an explosion of paper flowers sprouting from the wall.
But each of her creations began as the same thing--a book.
Hatzigeorgiou, 50, is a seventh-grade English teacher in Benicia, Calif. She is also an altered-book artist.
“I saw an altered book in a magazine a few years ago and thought it incorporated everything I wanted in a piece of art,” Hatzigeorgiou said.
Altering books--taking a used book and turning it into a piece of art by cutting, slicing, stamping and painting--has a growing following in the craft and art worlds. Craft enthusiasts looking for a new challenge, and professional artists looking to experiment with mixed media, are recycling old and unwanted books into new art.
“There are no rules to altered books,” said Pam Yee, president of the International Society of Altered Book Artists (ISABA), a nonprofit organization formed in 2002 to promote book altering as an art form. “They can be complicated or they can be simple, they can be arty or they can be elegant.”
Crafters of all types have found that they can apply their favorite art techniques to making altered books. ISABA’s membership includes 400 altered-book artists from around the world, while more recreational groups like those listed on Yahoo Groups have as many as 7,000 members.
Book pages can be painted, torn or folded into pockets or origami pop-ups. Altered book artists add pages from other books, zippers, drawers and secret compartments. They sew fabric, beads and found objects like leaves and stones into book pages.
“You can find art materials just about everywhere,” said Kim Tucker, 37, an artist in Mt. Vernon, Wash. “Your junk mail, tags from items you bought, even the labels from your food and wine. I personally find myself shopping for wine based on how well the label will look in my art, not taste.”
Gabe Cyr, author of “New Directions in Altered Books,” a guide to the art form, said, “It allows the ordinary person to play with art materials and create something that’s a wonderful surprise for them.”
Artists also find altering books a great way to deal with personal issues. Hatzigeorgiou started building spooky books incorporating broken dolls and religious images after her mother was diagnosed with Alzheimer's. Kim Tucker created her first altered book as an outlet for the stress she was feeling when her marriage began to fail.
“At first I showed no one this book because it is so deeply personal,” Tucker said.
Yee created altered book memorials for her family after her mother died. “Altered books are really good for any kind of self-expression,” she said. “It’s a good healing process.”
Book altering is the modern version of old recycling techniques. In the 11th century, when paper was scarce, monks would scrape the old ink from used books and manuscripts and write over them. In the late 19th century, fashionable Victorians illustrated books by pasting in pictures torn from other books and magazines.
The trend popped up again as fine art in the late 1960s, when British artist Tom Phillips bought an old Victorian novel called “A Human Document” and transformed it into what he called a “treated” book. Phillips crossed out lines and pages to create a new story, and added illustrations and paintings to make it into a work of art. When Phillips’ altered book was published in 1983 as “A Humument: A Treated Victorian Novel,” New York magazine called it “the closest a paperback book has come to being an art object.”
“It just sort of happened,” Phillips said. “I was on a shopping trip one Saturday in December, and I said I would work on the first book I could find for 3 pence.”
Phillips has continued to alter and re-alter the pages of the novel for the past 40 years.
“Everything I’ve ever wanted to say, I can find in that book,” he said.
The National Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington is exhibiting a collection of book art, containing many altered books, until February. Krystyna Wasserman, curator of book arts at the museum, says it is rare to see such exhibits outside of public libraries or private collections.
“They don’t get much exposure,” she said. “Very often when you go to a museum they have an exhibition of artists’ books, but it will be in the basement.”
One issue for altered book artists is dealing with the reaction of book lovers, who are generally squeamish about defacing books, even for artistic reasons. Historians and archivists look back on the Victorian book-altering fad with regret, fearing that rare and valuable books were destroyed.
“Hopefully people aren’t altering first editions,” said Cyr, the author of the guide to altered books. “But I know someone who altered a first edition of a Charles Dickens and didn’t realize it until they were already in the process.”
“I have a friend who has a used book store,” Yee said. “She was appalled that you’d ever alter a book. I told her we were keeping it out of the landfill, but she doesn’t see it that way at all.”
Then there’s the question of what the author would think. In the introduction to “A Humument,” Phillips apologized to the author of the original book, W.H. Mallock, for tampering with his work.
“I think he’d be shocked at what was found in his very prissy text,” Phillips said. “But his memory is kept alive more by what I did than what he did. So he can roll both ways in his grave.”
E-mail: sf2185@columbia.edu