move3: A movable book, from Deborah Phillips Chodoff

$2,750.00

(Deborah Phillips Chodoff) Move³: A movable Book. Artist’s book by Deborah Phillips Chodoff. [Katonah. NY] 20032007. Three double-page spreads. 10” x 11” x 1”. Materials used are: book board, hand-printed paper (Arches); inkjet prints on Legion Fine Art Paper; found objects; hardware items. Collages on board. By manipulating the movable parts on the cover you can play with the words ‘removable’ and ‘movable’ but not ‘immovable’, which is firmly glued in place. Laid in a black box with casters and a black string that both holds the lid closed and serves as a pull-string. An edition of 3 copies. Signed and dated in pencil on the back cover. Fine.

“The directive, which came by mail one day, to create a “movable book”, intrigued me. In pondering the question, “What exactly is a “movable book”? I found myself at the hardware store buying hinges, clothespins, pulley wheels, magnets, casters, and other accessories of movement rather than studying my how-to pop-up manuals. The word “move” was my starting point; I added new prefixes and settled on “removable” and “immovable” as complementary concepts. “ - Deborah Phillips Chodoff.

“Pages 1-2 (Removable): Photographs document the act of removal and objects likely to be removed; inkjet collages show the tools and substances of removal; parts of the pages are removable, held in place by magnets; hand-printed paper patterns were made by spraying and removing shapes.

“Pages 3-4 (Movable): Inkjet collages show moving parts, including scans of parts moving; part of a page is a removable disk that fits onto a bobbin and spins when a string is pulled, much like a Yo-Yo; hand-printed paper has patterns made by stamping and moving inked objects.

“Pages 5-6 (Immovable?): Aside from the ‘immovable’ bolt used to keep the bobbin in place, what in the universe is truly immovable? A crab fossil and images of stones in water underscore this question of permanence.” - Chodoff.