This past spring, I explored the idea of the “affordances and instructions“ of artist books with Jeff Nilan as we collaborated on a chapter for the book series Studies in Art & Materiality, edited by Dr. Veronica Peselman. We loosely defined the term “affordances” as the way the physical properties of an artist book allow for, grant, or facilitate a particular reading experience and we defined “instructions” as the way the materials of an artist book “communicate” to a reader how they should be engaged.
Subsequently, I ordered from PhotoEye the book,Private Photography in East Germany1980-2000 (editor: Friedrich Tietjen). My expectation was that this would not be an artist book, but rather a traditional codex, including a handful of essays together with photographs from selected East German photo albums (as per the publisher/distributer descriptions). To my surprise, upon receiving the book, I discovered that the foredges were not cut (illustration #1):
Illustration #1, Uncut, folded pages, Private Photography in East Germany1980-2000
Additionally, hidden inside the uncut pages were photos that could only be seen by peering in from the top (illustration #2):
Illustration #2, Images inside of uncut, folded pages, Private Photography in East Germany 1980-2000
The material properties of the book suddenly demanded it be read in a manner different from a traditional codex. Was this a printing mistake? Was it intentional? My curiosity piqued, I looked for other clues that might speak to the intentionality or otherwise of these hidden images. When I paged through to the back of the book in the hopes of finding a textual explanation, I was Instead surprised to find that the last pages, including 119-123 and the publisher’s information, to have been glued in upside-down (Illustration #3):
Illustration #3, upside down final section, Private Photography in East Germany 1980-2000
To be clear, the way the book was made was that the pages were printed front and back, folded in half, and then the edges that were not folded were “perfect bound” by glueing them all together. For the final section, however, the pages were glued in upside down.
This final section confused me as the upside-down pages indicated an error rather than the possible intentionality of the uncut pages. I decided to email Porter McLeod at PhotoEye to inquire about the book. In his initial response, he requested the images I included in the essay you are currently reading:
I never heard back from Porter after I sent him the images, though, so I emailed Specter Books and attached the same images:
Specter Books never responded either, which leaves me to interpret the book’s instructions solely on the materials themselves and to consider the affordances of the physical properties as I experience them.
Could it be that the images that are on the inside of the folded, uncut pages are not supposed to be looked at, but are there to speak to the myriad private images that have been made, like wallpaper? Or could it be that the images on the insides are private, as in the book’s title, and thus are present but not viewable? Or perhaps the folded, uncut pages are an invitation to pull out a letter opener, affording the reader the experience of discovery to reveal the images inside? I’m sure these interpretations do not exhaust the possibilities; however, the intentionality can be definitively established in the way that the page numbers are consistently visible and in sequence for the reader to clearly see, page by page, while the mysterious insides of the folded, uncut pages remain outside the numbering system.
As for the final upside-down pages, I would argue that this is clearly in error, not only because as in illustration #3, page number 119 is upside down, but because page numbers 120 & 121 are on the inside of the folded, uncut pages, so they are no longer part of the sequence that is visible to the reader. Furthermore, there is no purpose served by turning the book upside down when the pages that need to be read are hidden on the inside of the uncut pages in this section.
In conclusion, this book has had its innovative construction, which hides images in a beguiling manner, overwhelmed by the error of the last section having been mis-glued upside-down (and folded inside-out). Were it the case that the reader only faced the challenge of folded, uncut pages, it would pique curiosity rather than consternation. And as a final note, there is a note on the upside-down publisher’s page at the end of the book that I initially overlooked because it was upside down and which I later discovered that reads, “All images printed on the inner pages of this book are taken from the archives of Friedrich Tietjen, Martin Siebert and Karen and Andreas Koven” (illustration #4):
Illustration #4, final upside-down publisher’s page, Private Photography in East Germany 1980-2000
This exploration of the instructions and affordances of Specter Books, Private Photography in East Germany 1980-2000’s, gets at what distinguishes an artist book from a more traditional codex and how intentionality can be an important feature.
As a photobook artist, Alexander Mouton has been publishing limited-edition, hand-bound books for over 30 years. His Unseen Press photobooks are in the collections of the MoMA NYC, the Ghetty Research Institute, the German State Library in Berlin, and the Latvian National Library, among others. He teaches visual book classes at Seattle University. IG: theUnseenPress
