What’s your poison?
What do a book of gas station photographs and a field guide for identifying poisonous plants have in common? Each one inspired an artist’s book that centers plants in the design, materials, or narrative!
What makes a book an artist’s book? At its most basic, an artist’s book is a work of art that looks to the form of the book for inspiration. Artists’ books might maintain the standard book structure – called a codex – or reimagine it entirely, taking the shape of puzzles, scrolls, blocks, and even full tableaus, among many other variations. The Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections features an extensive collection of artists’ books, of which only a small selection are shown here.
Edward Ruscha. Twentysix Gasoline Stations, 3rd edition. Alhambra, California: Cunningham Press, 1969.
Considered the first modern artist’s book, Twentysix Gasoline Stations is famous for its influence on subsequent artists’ books, including Twentysix Plants.
Gift of Paul and Helen Anbinder.
Susan E. Mills. Twentysix Plants. Rosendale, NY: Published by Women's Studio Workshop, 2013.
Mills’s Twentysix Plants is comprised of exactly that – handmade paper from twenty-six different plants grown on the Women’s Studio Workshop ArtFarm. The pages are nested together, which allows the reader to see the adjacent paper through the digitally cut out plant name on each page. The book draws its inspiration from Twentysix Gasoline Stations, by the celebrated American artist Edward Ruscha.
Gift of H Peter Kahn.
George Henslow. Poisonous Plants in Field and Garden. London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1901.
The plant illustrated here is a hellebore, an ingredient for the Ides of Spring Party menu in Poisonous Plants at Table, below.
George Bentham. Handbook of the British Flora, vol. 1. London: Lovell Reeve, 1865.
The sweet violet illustration shown here is reproduced in Poisonous Plants at Table, below.
Trisha Hammer and Audrey Niffenegger. Poisonous Plants at Table. Chicago: Sherwin Beach Press, 2006.
Inspired by George Henslow’s Poisonous Plants in Field and Garden, this artist’s book weaves together excerpts from Henslow’s text and illustrations from George Bentham’s Handbook of the British Flora to create seasonal poisonous menus accompanying an original story, Prudence, the Cautionary Tale of a Picky Eater. In the story, Prudence’s pickiness leads her to be invited to four seasonal dinner parties that are not meant for the living…because all the menus are full of poisonous plants!
Gift of The Given Foundation Book Fund.