In this article, I would like to present the beginnings of an argument that the format of the artist book is uniquely equipped to embody a double queering—the verb: to make strange or subvert, and the noun: regarding LGBTQIA+ experiences. While I am not asserting that all artist books are queer, I would like to highlight book arts as a particularly apt medium for queer work.
Beth Sheehan. “Revision,” 2025. Offset printed accordion book.
First, it may be wise to acknowledge what my working definition of an ‘artist book’ is. Within the scholarly research of book arts, the question “what is an artist book” is a tempestuous one. It is generally agreed upon that an artist book is an art object that takes the form of a book, but what makes something a book? Why are other books like novels not typically considered artist books? Where is the line and why is the category of “artist book” useful?
Here, I am intending to include book arts objects that were conceived as complete art objects, meant to be experienced by an audience as such (this includes the object’s haptic and temporal qualities), where there is an important relationship to the democratic multiple, and where all aspects of the work and its reason for being a book become necessary to the experience of the work.
For the sake of word count, I would like to focus on the last two points, beginning with the work’s relationship to the democratic multiple. Democratic multiples are defined as “inexpensive artists’ books sold cheaply or even given away to as many people as possible. Typically democratic multiples convey a social or political message. The artist wants to get the word out with low production costs and self-distribution, by-passing the art gallery.”[1] This aspect of accessibility allows the work to live on as it is disseminated to many people, unlike most other art forms which are often made as singular, expensive works to be purchased by one museum or collector. Producing a democratic multiple is a way to create and perpetuate a futurity for the ideas held within the works. Connecting directly to the populist audience (as well as having more control over every aspect of the artwork by divorcing the work from the typical system of the art world) is paramount to an artist’s decision to create a democratic multiple. It is a transgressive act that critiques the standards of the hegemonic art systems.
Beth Sheehan. Editioning “Beloved,” 2016.
Therein, it is unsurprising that the type of artist that decides to make this form of work is often someone who is looking to subvert the typical modes of making, experiencing, and collecting artworks. Naturally, the history of the democratic multiple is intertwined with subcultures inhabited by many marginalized groups. Democratic multiples are a way for marginalized communities to share their perspectives, stories, and ideas with each other without the suppression and oppression that comes with needing to participate in the dominant art culture. Artist books, but especially artist books that fall on the closer end of the spectrum of democratic multiples, effectively subvert (or queer) the expectations set by white-box, high-art, fine art galleries and museums. (It should be noted here that I would argue even “expensive” artist books could be considered democratic multiples compared to many fine art paintings and sculptures, which is why I invite the idea of a spectrum when labeling these works democratic multiples.
Beth Sheehan. “In the Meaning,” 2025. Risograph and screen printed flag book.
Finally, I would like to address the ways in which the form of the artist book enhances the double-queering that is especially possible within this medium. Artist books occupy a space within the art canon that is overlooked, underutilized, underappreciated, and marginalized. However, because artist books are not quite 2D, 3D, or duration-based in the same ways as more mainstream mediums (for example, painting, sculpture, and video work, respectively), artist books can bridge qualities of other mediums while becoming their own thing—greater than the sum of their parts. (I talk a little more about this idea in my earlier blog post titled “Time and Book.”) Artist books embody a queer (subversive or unconventional) experience of time because they are time-based but without a set duration like sound or video work. Furthermore, artist books subvert the separation between the audience and the object by including the viewer as a participant, creating an intimacy with the work that dismantles the potential for othering the viewer, instead inviting us to include ourselves in the work—including us in the queering of experiencing the artwork.
[1] “Democratic Multiples,” Smithsonian Libraries, Accessed Dec. 10, 2025, https://library.si.edu/exhibition/artists-books-and-africa/democratic-multiples
Beth Sheehan is an artist currently living in Chicago, IL. She teaches paper, print, and book workshops around the US and virtually. She co-authored the book Bookforms. Sheehan has also worked as a professional printer at Durham Press and Harland and Weaver and was the Bindery Manager at Small Editions.
