This is a solo exhibition I had in September 2009, at Megalo Access Studio + Gallery.

I gave an account of the exhibition opening at my personal blog.

Exhibition statement:

I have a burning desire not to waste materials, and my personal artist’s books are made from paper or other materials left over from more formal projects. Many of my unique books are made from the print proofs, ghosts or off-cuts of commissioned letterpress work. I make them as a souvenir of a collaboration, or as an extension of themes that run through the text I’ve been working upon.

I am an avid reader and chronic daydreamer; I often spend so much time with the words and images of a single book project that it is refreshing to rework them in a different, more playful context, which allows me to extend my appreciation of the original text beyond the realms of the traditional page layout.

I also like to trawl second-hand book sales and rescue under-appreciated books to rework them into something people might value again. I might use the title and/or cover of vintage novels to begin new stories that the viewer can continue in their own imagination. In any case, my working methods seem perfectly in tune with a world that is once again recognising the need to re-use and recycle as a cultural process.

Selected works from the show:

Grieving: Let Go, 2009. installation of folded original letterpress pages
(from Poems to Hold or Let Go) and a vintage book spine.

Nightladders: After, 2009. Vintage book cover,
concertina papercut from offset-ink press proof pages.

Nightladders: Escape (detail), 2009. Vintage book cover,
papercut from offset-ink press proof pages.

Nightladders: Escape (detail), 2009. Vintage book cover,
papercut from offset-ink press proof pages.

Me, Like a River, 2009. Concertina flag book of
letterpress offcuts from the book Shared Rooms.

Never Kill a Dolphin, 2009, from the series ‘Jetsom’. Clamshell box from vintage book cover, lined with the book’s illustrations. [sold: private collection]