Somewhere Far From Habit: The Poet and the Artist's Book, an exhibition opening at the Longwood Center for Visual Arts in Farmville, Virginia, on January 22 and running through March, presents thirty collaborations between some of the country's most inspiring poets and accomplished book artists. The image above is one of the interior spreads of a book produced by artist Karen Kunc, who used woodcut and letterpress prints on Japanese Nishinouchi handmade kozo paper to enhance the poetry of former poet
laureate Robert Pinsky. "For me, there is a love of materials as I make my book projects—an awareness of paper, ink, proportion, color, relationships, finish, detail, all parts to the whole, with evidence of craftsmanship," Kunc writes in her artist's statement. "I am making an aesthetic object, even a beautiful one, as a carrier of important ideas." Other participating poets include E. Ethelbert Miller, who collaborated with Ben Blount, the late Jason Shinder (Audrey Niffenegger), Tom Sleigh (Hedi Kyle), and Natasha Trethewey (Margot Ecke). Curated by Mary Carroll-Hackett, Kerri Cushman, and Catherine Parnell, Somewhere Far From Habit, which premiered last November at the Pierre Menard Gallery in Cambridge, Massachusetts, will travel to the Association of Writers & Writing Programs Conference in Denver in April. For more information, visit somewherefarfromhabit.net.
