Artists’ Books at the

Center for Creative Photography Library

January 6, 2004, 10 a.m. – 12 noon

Miguel Juarez, Art & Photography Librarian

juarezm@u.library.arizona.edu

Today, we will be handling selected books that are housed in the CCP Rare Books Room
(remember to wear your white gloves!). These books do not circulate (except when
borrowed for exhibits within the library !) and can be viewed on site during the
Library’s hours.

Four years ago, prior to my arrival at the University of Arizona Library, I had little
knowledge of artist’s books. When I moved my office to the CCP Library (3 ½ years
ago), it is here, that I began working with artists’ books and began to appreciate their role
as resources for student learning. The collecting of artists’ books at the Center for
Creative Photography Library was initiated by Judith Golden, Emeritus Professor at the
College of Fine Art. Judith used to teach classes on book making and she closely worked
with the former Photography Librarian, Tim Troy, to purchase these materials. Tim was
active in purchasing these materials on a regular basis.

As the Art and Photography Librarian for the Center for Creative Photography Library
and the University Library, I continue to purchase artists’ books for our libraries’
collections. I usually designate photo-based books for the CCP Rare Books Room and
artists books for Special Collections. On occasion, I have encouraged local artists to
produce artists’ books so the library can purchase them especially if they are one-of-kind
and are of regional focus. In my opinion, artists’ books provide yet another important
vehicle for regional artists to present their work.

There are actually over 900 artists’ books in the University Libraries. A search for
artists’ books in SABIO (the online catalog) yielded the following:

540 artists’ books housed at the Center for Creative Library Rare Books Room
980 artists’ books housed at Special Collections
The CCP Photography collection also has other artists’ books in the CCP Print Vault.
Other books are housed at the CCP Research Center’s Archives.

We will be looking at artists’ books that are primarily housed in the Center for Creative
Photography Library for artists who recently participated in the Love and/or Terror
Exhibit. I have also included a select number of other books, as well as several un-
cataloged student books, to show you a diversity of materials. I have also pulled several
books from the regular stacks that touch on some aspect the work of two artists (Chong
and Golden) to give you some insight on their work that were included in the Love and/or
Terror Exhibit at the University Museum.

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There are various ways of analyzing artists’ books – we can ask the following questions:
• How it is printed?
• How it is contained or housed? How is it bound?
• How is it made?
• How many are made? Is it one of kind or is it a multiple?
• Who is it made for? Is it made to be handled? If so, will it hold up if it is
handled?
• How many people were involved in its creation?

If we divided artists’ books by how many were made we could say there are several
kinds:
• One of Kind
• Multiples
• Other kinds (maybe an automated future form that reproduces itself and then
collapses back into one?)
• Mediated form (collaborative form or one that changes over time?)

They can be divided by media/format:

• Mixed Media
• Photo-based
• Fine Press
• Letter Press
• Pop-up
• Miniature
• Photo-copied
• Ink-jet printed or the more sophisticated term: gigle

How it is put together?

• Binding, commercially or hand-bound
• Tied, welded, stand alone, other ways

The term artists’ book first appeared in 1973 when Moore College of Art in Philadelphia
hosted an exhibition of more than 250 different types of books created by artists during
the years of 1960 to 1973. Diane Perry Vanderlip, the gallery director and show organizer
is credited with originating this term. The books in this exhibit, "Artists Books" were
created by artists practicing in a broad range of mediums - musicians, choreographers,
painters and conceptual art.

The exhibit traveled from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to Brooklyn,New York and on to

Berkeley, California. The cross-country travel and ensuing reviews in Art in America and
Print Collectors Newsletter exposed the term artists books to a large audience. In the
review in Print Collectors Newsletter, author Nancy Tousley begins the definition of
artists books by explaining that the primary function of the artists book is "ideas, not
objects ...communication ... whether it is through words, words plus image, word-images
as objects, sequential images as text, 'art as idea' or book as object.”

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From “Discovering Artists’ Books” http://www.goshen.edu/~theodoreb/discovering/
index.htm

Albert Chong
Tracing cultures (not an artist book)
E184.A1 T72 1995 
Ancestral dialogues : the photographs of Albert Chong (not an artist book)
TR654 .C4867 1994 

Johanna Drucker
Simulant portrait
N7433.4.D78 S55 1990 

Carol Flax
Some (m)other stories, a parent(hetic)al tale

N7433.4.F53 S6 1995 
(Borrowed for Books Arts exhibit at Special Collections)

Brad Freeman
The grass is greener
N7433.4.F74 G73 2001
Overrun
N7433.4.F734 O8 1990 
SimWar
N7433.4.F734 S4 1991 

Scott McCarney
Memory Loss
Oversize N7433.4.M38 M4 1988

Shinro Ohtake
AT lanta 1945+50
N7433.4.O415 A8 1996 

Keith Smith
Bobby : book nr. 100
N7433.4.S55 A62 1985 

Keeyeth Smeyeth
eye : Minnesota Center for Book Arts, September 10 through November 19, 1988.
N7433.4.S55 K5 1988 
Patterned apart : a book in an edition of fifty copies
TR682 .S5 1983 

Nancy Solomon
Death/peace

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N7433.4.S64 D43 1993 
A package for Ms. Cel/lan/eous
N7433.4.S64 P33 1979 
Writing and reading : process and structure
N7433.4.S64 W78 1993 

Don Celender
Artball [game] : playing cards
N7433.4.C45 A7 1972
Karen Chance
Parallax
N7433.4.C62 A4 1987

Majorie Coffey
Animals
N7433.4.C568 A45 1998 
Who are these women who weep?
N7433.4.C568 W56 1996

Ed Epping
Abstract refuse : a heteronymic primer
N7433.4.E67 A73 1995

Mary Fontaine-Carlson.
Untitled
N7433.4.F66 A4 1991

Robert Heinecken
Wore khakis
TR654 .H446 2000

Jenny Holzer
[Black book posters].
N7433.4.H647 B533 1979 

Ann E. Kalmbach
My 9 migraine cures
N7433.4.K34 A4 1987

Susan King
Letter Portfolio
N7433.4 K54 L47 1970
Redressing the sixties : (art) lessons á la mode
N7433.4 .K45 2001

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Leslie Lyons
Strip flips : Lyle (flip book)
TR817.5 .L96 2002

Diana Stapleton
Learning to speak
N7433.4.S737 L43 1995

Clara T.Sligh
What’s happening with momma?
N7433.4.S54 W5 1988

Frederick Sommer
All children are ambassadors = Alle Kinder sind Botschafter
N7433.4.S65 A5 1992 

Troy Stephens
Big city : a pop-up book
N7433.4.S736 B5 1995 

Jill Timm
Calico ghosts : a photographic portrait of a silver mining town
N7433.4.T55 C35 2000 
Water Spirit : a native legend
N7433.4.T55 W38 1999 
White Sands
N7433.4.T55 W5 2001 
Yellowstone spring
F722 .T58 2001 
Yellowstone autumn
7433.4 T55 Y45 2003
Yellowstone winter
F722 .T583 2000 

Kelly Wolfe
[Silver satin cloth book]
N7433.4.K445 S55 1996

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Miguel Juarez received a B.A. degree in journalism from the University of Texas at El
Paso in 1985 and took graduate studies in Arts Administration and Chicano Research
Studies at California State University at Dominguez Hills and Museum/Gallery
coursework at California State University at Long Beach. Miguel is a 1999 graduate from
the State University of New York (SUNY) School of Information and Library Science
MLS program at the University at Buffalo. He was an Assistant Librarian (Art, Art
History and Photography) at the Prototype Fine Arts Library, and the Center for Creative
Photography Library for the University of Arizona Library and at the University of
Arizona Library from August 1999 to May 2005. In July 2005, he began working as the
first Hispanic Studies Librarian at the Cushing Memorial Library and Archive at Texas
A&M in College Station, Texas.

With fellow artist Paul H. Ramirez, he organized Juntos 1985, 1st Hispanic Art
Exhibition, which led to the formation of the Juntos Art Association. He has also
coordinated dozens of community art exhibits and readings. His poetry, prose, feature
articles, book and theater reviews, art work and photography have appeared in numerous
publications in Texas and California. Juarez has taught art history at the Instituto
Tecnologico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey (ITESM) in Ciudad Juarez,
Chihuahua as a visiting scholar via the El Paso Community College International Studies
Program.

In 1997, he published his first book, Colors on Desert Walls: the Murals of El Paso
(Texas Western Press, University of Texas at El Paso), a bilingual book, chronicling the
region's rich mural movement and its artists. He has also published chapters in the
following books: Ordinary Women, Extraordinary Lives: American Women's History
(2000, Scholarly Press); The Power of Language/el poder de la palabra: Selected Papers
from the Second REFORMA National Conference (2001, REFORMA and Libraries
Unlimited); Diversity in Libraries: Academic Library Residency Programs (2001,
Greenwood Press). He has written about museums in Culturework, the University of
Oregon, Arts Administration Program online newsletter and has published art and book
reviews in the REFORMA Newsletter; the Public Historian; the El Paso Times; El Paso
Herald Post and in aloud/en voz alta! an El Paso-based chapbook for Post-Modern Raza.
From 1997 to 1998 he co-produced a 19 part video interview series titled: “Frontera
Artists: Mexican and Chicano/a Artists in El Paso,” which airs on Saturday and Sunday
on Channel 14 in El Paso, Texas. He is presently working on a book on the work of
Painter and U of A Professor Alfred J. Quiroz.

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Miguel is also a photographer, artist, cartoonist who has published his photographs in
Low Rider Magazine, El Paso Times, the El Paso Herald Post and El Sol Newspaper.
One of his pieces of wearable cartoon art is owned by Fashion Designer Bob Macki. He
has exhibited work in El Paso, Texas, Las Cruces, New Mexico and New York City. In
April 15- July 15, 2004, he will be exhibiting one of his photographs in the Art Libraries
Society of North America Members Exhibition at Queen’s College Art Center in Queen’s,
New York.