Curated by Gusmano Cesaretti
October 15th - November 6th, 2011
Fifth Floor Gallery presents, "Bound Together", a group of artist books made by various artists and curated by photographer, Gusmano Cesaretti. Artists, Erik Castro, Ane Crabtree, Kasra Farahani, Hector Gonzalez, Kurt Mangum, Rebecca Mann, Robbie McDonald, Olivier Ozoux, Steven Tishkoff, and Gusmano Cesaretti himself contributed these hand-made works.
Bookworks are experiential and less about the passive act of reading; in some cases only resembling a book in form, they exude an expressiveness and openness not found in traditional books. The lack of a third party that edits or crafts the work makes it a unique opportunity to see the inner workings of the artist and a more personal and unedited relationship between the artist and their work. These books are rarely displayed in a manner that allows the viewer access to the whole of the work, the artist book most often keeps the majority of itself hidden. For this exhibition the books can be opened by the viewer thereby also binding a very intimate relationship between the artist and the viewer.
These various books contain sketches, collages, drawings, writing and many include multimedia aspects including ipods and even one which has a cover which can be played on a record player. The typical book format need not be adhered to as some may even fold out into a panorama. While stretching the boundaries of what is considered a “book” these works can easily reach the aesthetic level of objet d’art.