(Image: Aurie Jefferies)
Melanie Bush and Dr Emma Powell curate We Love Your Books, an open-submission exhibition of artists’ books, every year. Each year has a theme, and this years is ‘[e]motive’, to which there have been many varied responses. They write:
[e]motive is the theme for the ‘we love your books’ 2010 experimental artists’ books exhibition, to be seen at artwork-mk, Milton Keynes from 28th
August to 24th September.On show will be around 100 exciting and innovative artists responses, from the UK, USA, Canada, Italy, Mexico, Portugal and The United Arab Emirates. It is expected that selected books from the exhibition will
travel to other venues.
‘we love your books’ have produced 2 catalogues to accompany the show,
one shows the work of all the participating artists, the second is a
collaborative sketchbook including the work of many of the artists.
These catalogues can be purchased directly from http://rejectamenta.magcloud.com. we love your books is a creative collaboration between UK book artists
Dr Emma Powell (De Montfort University) and Melanie Bush (The University
of Northampton).We curate an annual open book arts exhibition, make artists’ books and
exhibition catalogues, teach creative book arts to our students and have
an archive of artists’ books in the Special Collection at The University of
Northampton Library. Our books and catalogues are in public and private
collections, including the Tate Library. Our exhibitions celebrate the diversity of book creation and alteration.Each year we set a theme for the exhibition, which national and
international book artists respond to. Past themes were Closure(2009),
re: (2008), ABC [add, book, collaborate] (2007), Full Circle/Random
Journey (2006), and Meeting in the Middle (2005).
Our exhibitions have shown the work of book artists from Australia,
Belgium, Canada, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Mexico, New
Zealand, Portugal, Russia, Spain, UK, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates,
Uruguay & USA.Selected work from we love your books exhibitions has travelled to other
venues such as Hereford College of Art & Design, The Art Shop,
Abavagenny, The University of Portsmouth, The University of Northampton
and The College of Fine Arts and Design, at The University of Sharjah,
United Arab Emirates.