Spiralbet (1998)
Spiralbet (1998)
Amy Lapidow
Tunnel book. Cloth bound and lined archival box. Closed:H165 x W185 x D5 mm. Open: D220 Acquired from the artist, 9 September 2022.
Photo: James Prinz
This work was first spotted in the online catalogue for Abecedarium: An Exhibition of Alphabet Books (1998) from the Guild of Bookworkers. Being a small thumbnail on the second screen or page and accessed only by clicking on the artist’s name, its discovery was serendipitous. Its still being available was pure luck.
Photo: Books On Books Collection.
Photo: Amy Lapidow.
The structure and binding are the work of Amy Lapidow, who has taught bookbinding at the North Bennett Street School in Boston, MA. The airbrush coloring was executed by student Nancy Ames.
Photo: Books On Books Collection.
Other tunnel books with which compare and enjoy Lapidow’s are Borje Svensson & James Diaz’s Letters and Animals (1982), Karen Hanmer’s The Spectrum A-Z (2003) and Helen Malone & Jack Oudyn’s The Future of an Illusion (2017).
Along with Lapidow’s and Hanmer’s explorations of color and the alphabet, Jean Holabird’s Vladimir Nabokov: AlphaBet in Color (2005), Carol DuBosch’s Rainbow Alphabet Snowflake (2013) and Rebecca Bingham’s Defining the Rainbow (2018) offer a range of variations to compare and contrast. Andrew Morrison’s Chroma Numerica (2019) offers a similar exploration of colors but with numbers.
Further Reading
“Annesas Appel“. Books On Books Collection.
“Rebecca Bingham“. Books On Books Collection.
“Carol DuBosch“. 13 December 2022. Books On Books Collection.
“Karen Hanmer“. 25 October 2021. Books On Books Collection.
“Jean Holabird“. 8 February 2022. Books On Books Collection.
“Helen Malone and Jack Oudyn“. 5 December 2017. Books On Books Collection.
“Andrew Morrison“. 15 September 2021. Books On Books Collection.
“Borje Svensson & James Diaz“. 9 September 2021. Books On Books Collection.
Metz, Barbara Lazarus (chair). 1998/99. AbeCedarium: An Exhibit of Alphabet Books. Guild of Bookworkers. Multiple locations.
Books On Books 