Do Kindles Dream of Spirit Duplicators?
Thematic project: Do Kindles Dream of Spirit Duplicators?
What is a book?
Throughout its history, the book has been declared dead many times, last with the Internet. With the current boom of e-book readers, the opposite seems to happen: electronic documents are becoming books again. All these developments seem to be based on a firm common sense of what a book is. Thorough historical and artistic investigations of the medium book will however reveal that there is no clear answer to the question of what a book is.
The Thematic Project will approach this issue from three angles: Historically (in the Theory Sessions) as an investigation of book utopias from Aldus Manutius to Mille Plateaux, artistically (in the afternoon sessions) as encounters with practitioners of book art and experimental writing, technically in a series of pioneering hack sessions on e-books.
Documentation
Each participant is supposed to create a wiki page to document the following aspects:
- Outcomes of weekly assignments
- Project plan
- Project concept
- Annotated bibliography
Final project and essay
The final project and essay should evolve from the weekly assignments. The project is supposed to be based on the role and transformation of the book in the networked media age. Use of the knowledge acquired in the technical sessions is encouraged.
Required readings and audiovisuals
Text books
- Alessandro Ludovico, The Mutation of Publishing (inofficial pre-published electronic manuscript, to be circulated)
- Johanna Drucker, A Century of Artists' Books
- O'Reilly Labs: EPUB Resources and Guides, http://labs.oreilly.com/2009/03/epub-resources-and-guides.html
Bibliography
- Marshall McLuhan, The Gutenberg Galaxy (74-75, 124-127, 155-158, 206-208), scans to be distributed
- El Lissitzky, Topography of Typography, 1923
- Francesco Colonna/Aldus Manutius, Hypnerotomachia Polifili, 1499
- Sebastian Brant/Albrecht Dürer, Das Narrenschiff, 1499
- Laurence Sterne, Tristram Shandy, 1759
- Stéphane Mallarmé, Un coup des dés, 1914
- Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, Zang Tumb Tumb, 1912-1914
- Roland Barthes, The Death of the Author, 1968
- Yvonne Rainer, Film about a woman who..., 1974
- Robert Coover, The End of Books, 1992
- N. Katherine Hayles, Writing Machines, 2002 (in the library)
- Deleuze/Guattari, A Thousand Plateaux (introduction), 1980 (in the Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism, library)
Audiovisuals
Peter Greenaway, Prospero's books, 1991 (animated book scenes can be watched on YouTube)
Guests
- Jan Voss, Amsterdam, owner of the Boekie Woekie bookstore for artists' books, editor of the works of Dieter Roth
- LAFKON, Germany, 3-days-workshop on generative graphic design with TeX
- Chris Meade, England, Institute for the Future of the Book (via Skype)
- mez breeze, Australia, net artist and writer (via Skype)
- Caitlin Fisher, Canada, theorist, creative writer and web artist (via Skype)
- Stephan Saaltink, director WdKA, former art director NRC Handelsblad and Vrij Nederland
Thematic Project Planning
Please refer to the Trimester overview planning for important dates and project schedule.
- Theory Sessions
- Tech days
- EPUB Hacking Sessions 1, 2, 3 and 4
- workshop LAKFON
Attachments
