“Playing is a serious thing!”*

These are Bruno Munari’s words that I share. I play and I have fun with my papers and my colours, but it is a job and a job, even if enjoyable, is a serious thing.
My notes on image diaries are serious. A collection of thoughts translated into images, that are daily, just like a diary, “annotated” on nearly three hundred pages. I use the stencil technique with a monochromatic press, an imaginary thread connects them and creates a long history that develops, touching on events that have hit me in a particular way.
It is my imaginary world, but at the same time, very real. Paper, card, fabric, needle, thread, colours and gouges are the materials that allow me to work and to leave my fantasy and creativity free.
I have one very small study, but it is sufficient.
It is welcoming, full of books, with a great ceiling window, three tables, two chalcographic presses and one press. When I am sitting in my workplace, I manage to isolate myself in my world. I can stay seated for hours without the passing time weighing on me, making me happy with this choice of life. — Eleonora Cumer

libro catalogo con interventi manuale (2019)

libro catalogo con interventi manuale / “book catalogue with manual interventions” (2019)
Eleonora Cumer
Sewn booklet, various papers including photographic, gold leaf, thread, mesh, string, wax. H200 x W220 (variable) mm. [16] pages. Unique. Acquired from the artist,.
Photos: Books On Books Collection.

Many catalogues of individual artist’s books aim to be works of art themselves. Some attempt this with fine press production and limiting the edition, which sometimes succeeds. Some embody the very material and techniques that the artist used to create the items represented in their pages. Eleonora Cumer’s libro catalogo con interventi manuale / “book catalogue with manual interventions” (2019) is an extreme and stunning example of the latter. It is extreme because it is unique, not a limited edition. It lacks any identifying captions or list of works (the captions below appear only as a convenience for this entry in the Books On Books Collection). Libro catalogo con interventi manuale stands on its own as a stunning work of book art.

As the richly textured and gold-leafed cover turns, notice how Cumer presents the image of the catalogue’s first work: Parole non dette, frasi in sospeso / “Unspoken words, unfinished sentences” (2018). Split and pasted on two sides of the first folio, the glossy photograph of Parole non dette reunites with precise registration in the center of the folded folio.

When the right half of Parole non dette turns, the second work — controcorrente /”against the current” (2010) — comes into view.

controcorrente /”against the current” (2010)

Although pasted on one side of the folio, the photograph of controcorrente splits in two at the fold, the left side and right side precisely registered with one another on either side of the fold. This is subtle. First an image reunited and aligned by virtue of cut and fold, then second an image separated but aligned by virtue of cut and fold. We may be long used to how juxtaposition works artistically on the flat surface of collage or the multiple surfaces of assemblage. Cumer teaches this afresh with the flat and multiple surfaces of book structure as well as with the materials and techniques of bookmaking.

The next three works appear in a fold-out insert attached to the stub of a textured folio that also supports a brown paper folio following the insert. The colorful città / “city” (2018) reflects how Cumer’s palette and sculptural repertoire extends beyond the black and white leporello of controcorrente. The threads sewn in parallel over the photograph of città not only reflect another part of Cumer’s material repertoire, they also enact another part of her sculptural repertoire in the way they work with, in, and across the photographs and folios.

città / “city” (2018)

When the image of città / “city” folds out to the right, photographs of two more works appear: desiderio di … arte / “desire for … art” (2012) and illusione – delusione / “illusion – delusion” (2012). The image of desiderio highlights Cumer’s use of the flag book structure, although there is structurally much more to that work’s composition. The parallel threads that extended over the photo of cittá on the other side of the fold-out now pierce the photograph of illusione – delusione.

desiderio di … arte / “desire for … art” (2012) and illusione – delusione / “illusion – delusion” (2012)

The next work to appear — il libro segreto /”the secret book” (2018) — carries on with the intervention and penetration by thread. The patterns formed by the thread reflect and extend those which can be seen in the photograph of il libro segreto. Leaping out of the photograph and penetrating the supporting brown paper folio, the thread introduces a new motif that will recur in just a few more pages.

il libro segreto /”the secret book” (2018)

The spread presenting the next work — fili intrecciati / “twisted threads” (2018) — reverts to the split aligned photo as used with controcorrente, but here the division comes at the center of the double-page spread. Off to the left side, the abstract figure in stitched thread echoes the technique used in fili intrecciati itself and starts another recurring motif in the catalogue.

fili intrecciati / “twisted threads” (2018)

No intervention occurs in the photograph of cancellazioni e riscruttare / “cancellations and rewritings” (2018). No cuts, no folds, no threads, but on the facing verso page, Cumer brings to life one of the cancelled/rewritten objects that can be seen in the photograph. Just as in fili intrecciati, the thread-bound bundle of strips of cut text has leapt from two dimensions to three dimensions, highlighting again how Cumer uses the flat and multiple surfaces of book structure as well as the materials and techniques of bookmaking to re-teach us how juxtaposition works artistically on the flat surface of collage and the multiple surfaces of assemblage.

cancellazioni e Rriscruttare / “cancellations and rewritings“ (2018)

Following but elaborating on the previous spreads’ motif of juxtaposing an extract of the work with a photograph of the work, Cumer places a red-threaded square of tartalan across from the cut and misaligned photograph of la poesia dell’universo / “the poetry of the universe” (2018). The cut photograph is split by a red stitch that divides in two itself.

Here is where the variation on the two dimensional becoming three dimensional introduced by il segreto libro recurs. Defying the gutter’s separation of the tartalan sample from the whole work and the severing of the photo on the recto page, threads from the sample cross the gutter, fall across one half of the photograph, and link up with the severing stitch. The thicker thread of the severing stitch passes under the other half of the photograph to exit from it on the right and fall across the image of red threads similarly exiting the work itself. The ways in which this double-page spread speaks to the self-reflexive nature of book art and the paradoxical relationship of art to what it re-presents are remarkable.

la poesia dell’universo / “the poetry of the universe” (2018)

The final work in the catalogue — visioni urbani / “urban visions” (2015) — resides in the Books On Books Collection. More about it can be found here. Threads do not make an appearance in visioni urbani, but their triangular appearance here does reflect on urbani visioni. If the space to the left of the red stitching can be counted as a page, this is a “three-page” spread echoing the three-way split of the photo of the work, which echoes the tripartite physical structure of the work itself.

visioni urbani / “urban visions” (2015)

In the colophons of several earlier works, Cumer has drawn attention to this practice in libro catalogo of recycling her works. She labels them as part of projects “born of work with old books”, “born from her artist’s books”, and “born of her work with old theater posters”. Three of them are explored below, and three others can be found in a previous entry on her work.

PRESENTE/OTASSA (2015)

PRESENTE/OTASSA / “Present / Tax” (2015)
Eleonora Cumer
Sewn booklet. H287 x W204 mm. [8] including cover. Edition of 50, of which this is #19. Acquired from the artist, .
Photos: Books On Books Collection.

Whether read as otassa presente or presente otassa, the translation of this sewn booklet’s title comes out the same: a present tax. The phrase in the background — usa e getta — stamped over ghosted images of cutout book pages means “disposable” and is used as the title of a 2014 work. The ghosted book pages come from the Italian edition of Mario Puzo’s last novel Fools Die, a Hollywood/Wall Street potboiler. The front cover’s sealed plastic envelope containing cut-up sewing patterns, buttons, thread and an old photograph of a little girl wearing a knit shawl and sitting in a white wicker chair makes the intriguing juxtapositions only more so. What do these collaged and assembled elements have to do with one another?

Some clarity dawns with phrases on the interior pages: gli anni passano (“years go by”), i ricordi riaffiorano (“memories come back”), and nitide immagini del passato (“clear images of the past). “Disposable” alludes not only to the novel whose pages wallpaper the cover and interior pages but also to Cumer’s work of the preceding year — USA E GETTA (2014), a series of unique altered books. The series is the source of the images inside PRESENTE/OTASSA. Each shows a hollowed-out book with an object held in place between clear plates — a picture frame (empty except for the reflection of the foreground — the rest of the work it comes from), a stuffed toy, and a broken dress-up doll. Things of the past that in general are disposable (like sewing patterns no longer needed or broken dolls) nevertheless come back as clear images: a tax on the present.

radici/ in memoria dei miei genitori (2015)

radici/ in memoria dei miei genitori / “roots/ in memory of my parents” (2015)
Eleonora Cumer
Sewn booklet with stitching. H287 x W206 mm. [8] pages. Edition of 50, of which this is #11. Acquired from the artist, .
Photos: Books On Books Collection.

The theme of memory continues in radici/ in memoria dei miei genitori / “roots/ in memory of my parents” (2015) but perhaps more poignantly than in presente/otassa. Drawing on the previous works moltitudine e solitudine / “multitude and solitude” (2013) and no time no space (2015), the booklet also evokes Cumer’s passion for textile and fabric art. The small image of a sewing box in the lower left hand corner of the central spread may speak to a parental source of that passion, but the words on the other spreads — recise and solitudine e un grande dolore (“severed or sever or cut” and “loneliness and a great sorrow”) — turn that central spread into a collage of loss almost more so than a collection of memories. It is one of the more somber works by Cumer in the Books On Books Collection.

immagini (2015)

immagini / ‘“images” (2015)
Eleonora Cumer
Sewn booklet with stitching on the last page. H287 x W206 mm. [8] pages. Edition of 50, of which this is #20.
Photos: Books On Books Collection.

The booklet immagini / ‘images” (2015) takes its images from two earlier works — progetto vecchie locandine teatrali – realtà o finzione (2013), a poster consisting of three theatrical playbills cut, overlaid, and painted, and progetto vecchie locandine teatrali – realtà o finzione  – libro illeggibile / old theater posters – reality or fiction – unreadable book (2014), which consists of theatrical playbills cut and stitched to create an unreadable book.

The overlaid phrases immagini ritagliate, immagini scomposte, and immagini cucite can be translated as “cut out images”, “distorted images”, and “stitched images”, respectively. On the cover of the unreadable book displayed, the words FINZIONE / “fiction” and REALTÁ / “reality” are spelled in reverse. As in libro catalogo, there is self-reflexivity at play here. Cumer plays with the word ritagliate by printing ri in black and tagliate in white, creating two verbs — ritagliate (“cut out”) and tagliate (“cut”), which apply to the word itself, the technique in the poster displayed, and the fragment of it blown up on the double-page spread. By blurring the image on the recto page of the second double-page spread, she makes the spread play out the meaning of scomposte — “distorted”. And in the third spread, she playfully stitches over the word cucite — “stitched” — which comments not only on the word but also on the stitched unreadable book on the verso page.

Play is, indeed, a serious thing.

Further Reading

“Eleonora Cumer (I)“. 6 September 2019. Books On Books Collection.

Pellacani, Elisa, et al. 2018. Book Secret : El Libro de Artista, Un Misterio = the Artist Book, a Mystery = Il Libro d’Artista, Un Mistero. Reggio Emilia, IT: Consulta libri & progetti.

*Giocare è una cosa seria!
I bambini di oggi sono gli adulti di domani
aiutiamoli a crescere liberi da stereotipi
aiutiamoli a sviluppare tutti i sensi
aiutiamoli a diventare più sensibili.
Un bambino creativo è un bambino felice!

“Playing is a thing!
Today’s children are tomorrow’s adults.
Let’s help them grow up free from stereotypes.
Let’s help them develop all their senses.
Let’s help them become more sensitive.
A creative child is a happy child!”
Bruno Munari, on occasion of 1986

Bruno Munari, 1986, on occasion of a Children’s Workshop Laboratory, prompted by a series of seminars promoted in 1977 by Franco Russoli, Superintendent of the Pinacoteca di Brera.