Lost Souls, some closure

After a year of the creepy eye project marinating -- as an artist's book for the California Guild of Bookworker's "Look A Book!" exhibition, then as an edition of fifty created for the Codex book fair, the fifteen deluxe editions are finally completed. Two of them have been acquired by institutional libraries; two are not for sale; eleven are available for purchase.

Amissa Anima: the book of the dead

Two volumes in clamshell box.

 
Eye engraving, Dioptrique oculaire, Chérubin d’Orléans, 1671. The Spirit Photographs of William Hope, the National Media Museum. The Ouija, Kennard Novelty Co., Museum of Talking Boards. Printed on Asuka on an Indigo printer with Joss paper endpapers. Bound in laminated Asuka paper over marbled paper.

The deluxe edition contains a bell (Hearts (fractured)), book, and candle (Life (spark of)), three essential tools used in summoning of the spirit world; and a set of bottled emotions, as strong emotional memories link the spirit world to the corporeal. The bottled emotions contain metaphorical representations of human experience:


Animal magnetism: Felis catus vibrissae; Anticipation (concentrate): coastal sand; Disbelief (suspension): rosehips from Rosa multiflora Thunb.; Hope (kindling of): phosphorus sesquisulfide and potassium chlorate on a balsa wood base; Memories (suppressed): Buddhist incense; Misdirection: antique key; Promises: seeds from Symphyotrichum lanceolatum; Rage (bottled): seeds from Asclepias syriaca L.; Resentment (shards): shattered family china.

Deluxe edition of 15. 2016.

This concludes the creepy eye infestation of the studio.