8.75 X 13.5 X .75" Letterpress printed by Mark Atwood at Artist Press in South Africa on Dobbin Mill papers, human hair. Clew looks at the marriage tree in a Hindu temple in Durban, South Africa. The prose, printed in thin lines of red across a translucent paper, crosses over pulp painted commentary on both its front & back. The text considers the ongoing ritual of young women wrapping the tree with silk threads as a prayer for a potential spouse – and in doing so, the book makes connections between text / texture / textile, as it also connects issues of marriage & bondage. The final sentence was printed on a hanging tag that needs to be spun around in order to be read. The first image in the book is an archival inkjet photo of the actual marriage tree; the polymer plate printed image of Silverberg's spouse with arms bound up with silk threads functions as a wrapper that holds the text leaves. Glued-down stripes of human hair create suggested text lines on the final leaf (& colophon) of the book. |
