Something to do with artists’ books…
This was the overarching thought rattling around in my brain when thinking what to do for the microteaching session. This is a significant area of my teaching as a Graphic Design subject librarian and I regularly incorporate the artists’ book collection within my teaching as it is a fruitful resource in introducing a myriad of artists and ideas to students from first-year BA to MA students.
I want to use the microteaching session as an opportunity to experiment with a more interactive approach as I often feel that I fall back on more didactic methods of teaching, particularly when engaging with a bigger group. This serves as an opportunity to try out ways that could be more interactive and encouraging of discussion.
Some ideas of focus for the session included:
Making connections between artists’ books – facilitating a discussion about artists’ books and how to interact with them in terms of form, subject and genre.
Alteration in artists’ books
Form + function
I want to keep it as simple as possible and create a session which could be expanded into my regular sessions with first year students as an introduction to the collection as well as introducing a critical engagement with objects.
Objectives of the session would be to:
- Develop an understanding of what artists’ books are
- Think about the form of the book and how this has been used to convey the artist’s practice (focusing on formats and materials)
- Think about how these books can facilitate discussion and potential application to students’ own practice.
Preparing for the session
A challenge for this object-based learning session is that I won’t actually be able to have the objects with me. I have instead taken lots of pictures of the objects from different angles and interactions, along with some images of the library catalogue description as well as some supplementary information. I will print these out and give them to participants so they still have something physical to hold.
Object selection:
- Colomb, I. (n.d) Aberrations. London: Iris Colomb.
- Johanknecht, S. and Newson, J. (1994) Crevice/map. London: Gefn Press.
- Phillips, T. (1987) A humument: a treated Victorian novel. London: Thames and Hudson.
- Lorenz, A. (1998) The nomad’s chair. [Bologna : Angela Lorenz]
This selection of objects focuses on disruptions of the form of the book.
Image reference list:
Figure 1. Colomb, I. (n.d) Aberrations. [Photograph]. Available at: https://iriscolomb.com/PRACTICE/ABERRATIONS. (Accessed: 5/2/2025)
Figure 2. Lorenz, A. (1998) The nomad’s chair. [Photograph] Available at: https://digitalcollections.arts.ac.uk/object/?code=koha:195783 (Accessed: 5/2/2025)
Figure 3. Love, R. (2025) Photograph of Tom Phillips’ The Humument.[Photograph]
Figure 4. Johanknecht, S. and Newson, J. (1994) Crevice/map. [Photograph] Available at: https://digitalcollections.arts.ac.uk/object/?code=koha:72049 (Accessed: 5/2/2025)
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