Like books? Like art? Like arty books? Book Show is a new exhibition put on by thos uber cool Eastside projects folk.

The exhibition contains various art pieces that address the physical form of a book. The exhibition is born from Ulises Carrión’s provocative series of aphorisms ‘The New Art of Making Books’ (1975). Carrión was the founder of Other Books and So in Amsterdam, a gallery and bookstore that during its short life (1975 to 1979) became the first major centre for the flourishing international artist-led publishing scene.

Carrión’s text establishes the specific conditions of the book as a display device:
   A book is a sequence of spaces.
   Each of these spaces is perceived at a different moment—a book is also a
   sequence of moments.
   A book is not a case of words, nor a bag of words, nor a bearer of words.
   A writer, contrary to the popular opinion, does not write books.
   A writer writes texts.

Carrión’s ideas on the form of the book stresses that there is no inherent union between the material form of the book and its printed contents, and implies that each body of material to be made into a book must somehow be addressed to the display conditions that the book offers. The exhibition features various works that take apart, rebuild and asses the form different texts.

There is also a little extension of the main exhibition called ‘Book’. Launching on 29th July, Book is a mobile addition to the piece, it includes various artworks such as facsimile reprint of Ulises Carrión’s ‘The New Art of Making Books’ as it originally appeared in the journal Kontexts; an illustrated text by James Langdon and additional works, both existing and newly commissioned.