Bookish Mary

  I recently learned about Asemic Writing Art and realized that I had done some of it in the past without knowing it had a name.   Asemic writing is a wordless open semantic form of writing.  It has no meaning and no specific context.  The meaning or interpretation of such a piece of art is left solely up to the reader or viewer.  Asemic writing art is a hybrid art form that fuses text and image into unity and then sets it free to arbitrary subjective interpretations.  ( Wikipedia)     And so I put my hand to the task after doing some research and viewing the beautiful pieces of asemic writing art that have been created by artists.   Ginkgo Leaves  I turned these pieces into an artist's book.  I hand drew the ginkgo leaves, coloured them with water colours and ink and then proceeded with the asemic writing.   These pieces are abstract in nature and I used heirogliphic symbols and alchemy symbols to complemen...

  GAMBLERS ALL   is a poem by Charles Bukowski. In this accordion book I made a stencil for the human figure.  The text is handwritten and the different parts of the body are decorated with water colours and collaged pieces of paper.   Protective envelope for the accordion book.  Fabriano card stock and photograph.   Back closure of protective envelope.  Front page: stenciled figure with abstract drawings coloured with water colours and ink.  Hand written text with decorated human body parts, collage.  Back of accordion book: full body, abstract drawing coloured with water colours and ink, collage.  Open accordion book. 

  BE KIND AND I LIKE YOUR BOOKS  Two poems by Charles Bukowski are in this artist book.  I like Bukowski's poetry because he 'tells it like it is' without apology.  His writing expresses how he experiences life in the moment.  It is truthful with a smatter of sarcasm, humour and is sardonic.   The first poem in the book is Be Kind and the second poem is I Like Your Books.  I used a light weight Japanese paper for this book and experimented with water colours.  The paper is soft to the touch and is semi-transparent. I hand drew abstract images throughout the pages of the first poem,   The soft cover with photograph: Fabriano card stock, yellow linen thread.   Fly leaf: Japanese string paper and hand drawn flower and cover page with Be Kind.  The poem, I LIKE YOUR BOOKS, starts here and has water colour and text on each page.  I first discovered Bukowski's poetry when I was playing with the flip open book.  Th...