Some time ago I made this clay sculpture, I started it because I wanted to express how I see the concept of book and how i feel about it.
I wanted to show that for me a book is really not a square of printed paper, a book is something flexible, malleable, expressive, dynamic, like a fabric, as you read it is shaped by the person you are.
I left the cover hard and square as in my eyes it's the steady gate into the world of imagination that is held within.
I carved in the clay words and sentence from my favorite books
and I played with it's form until I felt it got to where the work expresses the feelings that I tried to explain in words...
I wanted to share with you some of the things that stimulate me and give me inspiration along the way...
I want to start with this cute video by Lane Smith, this is a book trailer video for a short animated film based on Lane Smith's 'It's a Book', an adorable picture book for children that celebrates traditional books.
There is something romantic in books and maybe some people see tham as outdated and outmoded, but between the romantic character and the perishable and morbid nature of tham to me they just always remain enchanted.
Here's another artist that uses books in his works, he arranges them in space, builds with them architectural sculpture or carving them to create a whole new shape. His name is Miler Lagos.
Here is a short explanation about his work:
"Miler Lagos’ sculptural works and interventions invite the viewer to reconsider an object’s material properties. By rendering paper and sculpting foam, Lagos produces objects which appear to be made of solid wood or cast bronze. While his works initially seem to be revisiting disputes between the original and its copy, his choices of material or subject matter often engage with local environmental or specific political concerns.
Lagos has made an extensive body of work by developing a technique of carving piles of compressed paper into singular log-like forms. In El papel aguanta todo (Paper can handle anything), 2008, Lagos incorporates various reference books into this process to create an installation of tree-like sculptures. In each piece the books’ spines and titles are left partially revealed, drawing attention to the physical quality of these specialised texts. On the other hand, the abundance of printed material included in the installation points to the homogenising nature of the books format."
This was taken from The Latin American Art Journal - here
Interesting detail to me is that he chose in this piece and in other pieces to use the books cover as the structure interior
Almost all the pictures were taken from the artist site
"Artist Alicia Martin's tornado of books shoot out a window like a burst of water from a giant hose. The Spain-based artist's sculptural installation at Casa de America, Madrid depicts a cavalcade of books streaming out of the side of a building. The whirlwind of literature defies gravity and draws attention with its grandeur size. There have been three site-specific installations, thus far, of the massive sculptural works in this series known as Biografias, translated as Biographies, that each feature approximately 5,000 books sprawled out around and atop one another.
Biografias2003, site specific installation, Casa de America, Madrid "piece in motion"
Martin's giant book structures give life to the inanimate objects filled with knowledge. By constructing the curving towers with a rather free and disheveled exterior, while maintaining a sturdy core, the books' loose pages are free to blow and rustle in the wind, allowing the piece to be further animated. Take a look at the short video, below, to see the piece in motion."
Well, I had some difficulties with the inspiration board because at some point my brain was working overtime thinking about the subject...
So here is what it comes to in the end I'll show you some of the process of formation the inspiration board so you can see how it happened and how I got this result:
