Aftermath - The DSM Arts Festival

Here are a few photos from the Des Moines Arts Festival. I had so much fun ... and so many questions to answer about this body of work.

Most people were really attracted to the bright colors and unusual arrangement. I was really lucky to be in an end spot, which allowed me a little bit of bonus space outside my 10'x10' allotment, but more importantly, it put me in a premium spot as the first booth on the right as patrons walked through a main entry to the festival streets.

I had some brown craft bags printed with the name of this project (you can see one in this picture), and I was happy to sell a few bags as people entered just as impulse items. Probably the cheapest thing to buy at the festival!

It was clear that many people just enjoyed seeing books - most of them old books, a few of them new books. It was a stretch for some people to accept and appreciate books as part of a body of conceptual art. Some were just simply horrified that I had violated perfectly good books with bullet holes.

In addition to books that have been shot, I also included a few Golden Books that are caught in old, rusty hunting traps - you can see Chicken Little in the foreground with the bright yellow cover. That book was actually a 1930s copy that was already falling apart, so I didn't feel too bad about letting it get caught in the jaws of a rusty trap, but still, it was really just as difficult to execute those pieces as the ones that I shot - pun fully intended.

A big conversation starter was another piece in the foreground - do you see the one with the black gas pipe drilled through a pile of askew books? That is my Book Club. Intended for home security - use it for self defense. I carried it around like a bat on my shoulder, but it is very heavy (about 15 pounds), so even though I play softball, I didn't swing it very often. Besides, there were too many people around to do that without causing fright. It worked just as well as a walking stick, and I encouraged people to hold it and think about the metaphor. Lots of laughs and interaction with that one. I would love to make a custom cabinet for it - like the wooden cabinets that used to be used for a fireman's axe. Now, we usually see a fire extinguisher in a metal box with a glass front. That display would be another homage to Ray Bradbury.

This piece is titled "Rorschach Test", and features two dictionary 
pages from the first section of a 1959 Webster's in the area that has the "new" words in it. Rorscach Test was one of the new words,along with others like "schizophrenia", "seabees", and an  entire collection of other post WWII era military terms.

I have used a bird's skull in the center as well as beaver jawbones in the four corners. The lead buttons are those that used to be used to match house window sashes with screens and storms - in the day when they were framed with wood. In the fall you removed the wood framed screens from your windows and replaced them with wood framed storm glass to keep the winter chill outside.

The antique glasses are yellow to match the yellow in the beaver teeth. I thought of using rose-colored glasses for the metaphor, but then it would not match the teeth, and I really wanted to keep the sepia-tone palette going throughout the whole piece. Non-glare plexiglas is used to complete the look of an archeological museum display in a cabinet, with the entire blue-framed piece appearing to float between the layers.

I was not able to get a really good shot of the actual shelving unit inside the booth - it was always surrounded with people in a very small space. However, I did take the above photo in our back yard that really highlights my husband's talents. We had several lengthy discussions about possible displays, and if time were no factor, we would have created an entire tree with books growing out of the branches.

What we made allowed us to include the use of doors as shelves, which helped tie together the whole analogy of "books as doorways" with the doorknobs on the books themselves. It was tricky for him to cut the individual logs so that the doors would sit relatively level on them, but he is a skilled perfectionist. I was fortunate to have the Queen Anne's Lace in bloom - I love this picture of the trees in the meadow.

Even the knob used to hold a bag was an antique cabinet knob.

It seemed throughout the festival that people who talked to me were genuinely interested in hearing about the idea behind The Death of Books. Most of these people were baby boomers, like myself. Lots of teachers - lots of librarians - lots of students.

One of my favorite parts of the booth was the yellow papered wall in the back with the giant red letters that spelled out "READ". I actually bought these letters from the North Side Library when they remodeled and upgraded their signage. It was my intent to have a house big enough to have a large library so I could install the LIBRARY letters on my wall. Didn't happen. I mean, it hasn't happened ... yet! I have downsized my thinking a little bit and now plan on using the word READ instead. Still don't have the house that it will fit, but I do have the letters.

So I covered the back wall with yellow paper and hung Sharpies from string in various spots with the hope that people would write their own comments. I wrote something on the paper as starter, but it took no time at all for the idea to bloom. I am going to just share some of those photos and let you enjoy them...

 

 

I have no idea what the foreign language comments are, but I choose to believe that they are positive notes from a fellow book lover. I originally just had paper installed above the silver bar (see photo below), but it was filling up fast and few could reach the area above the red letters, so on the second day I added more strips of yellow paper below the silver bar. After the shelves were taken apart and removed from the booth, I snapped this shot of my ten foot wide back wall. Now, I am thinking when I have a big enough house to have a large library, I will install these red letters on my wall, but I think I will include the yellow paper behind them. The messages are so personal and so profound, they give me a lump in my throat when I read them.