AMBruno
[sic]

AMBruno' new book project for 2017 was [sic], with fifteen books by sixteen artists showing singularly diverse responses to the theme.

The brief was to make a book in which the content (whether text/image/other) and/or the formal and physical elements (such as page layout and sequence, binding and materials) are in some way at odds with assumptions of what a book should be or do. sic is short for sic erat scriptum (thus, or, thus was it written). It is inserted after a quoted word or passage to indicate that this has been transcribed exactly as found in the source text. The notation's usual purpose is to inform the reader that any errors or apparent errors (for instance misprints, surprising assertions, faulty reasoning or spelling) are intentionally reproduced.

Books by artists often confound expectations; here the challenge might be to make something that initially seems to be/have mistakes and then to reveal an underlying logic - or not, and so remain in themselves non-sequiturs.

The books in the [sic] collection were selected by Sarah Bodman.

The [sic] artists are: Karen Blake, Egidija Čiricaitė, Judy Goldhill, Rachael Hand, Julie Johnstone, Lydia Julien, Katarina Kelsey, Sharon Kivland, John McDowall, Steve Perfect, Peter Rapp, Rachel Smith, Cally Trench & Philip Lee, Lena Wurz, and Stephanie Yang.

The [sic] collection of books was launched at PAGES Leeds / International Contemporary Artists' Book Fair, at The Tetley (4th to 5th March 2017).

The [sic] collection was also shown at the Bristol Artists Book Event (BABE) at the Arnolfini, Bristol (1st to 2nd April 2017).

AMBruno's [sic] collection was also shown was at MISS READ: Berlin Art Book Festival (14th to 16th July 2017) at Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin. This was AMBruno's first time at MISS READ; it was a great location and a very busy fair, with good conversations. Thank you to the AMBruno team at MISS READ: Judy Goldhill, Katarina Kelsey, Rachael Hand, John McDowall and Sophie Loss.

The complete [sic] collection was bought for the Kunstbibliothek Berlin (Berlin Art Library), one of Germany's leading art history institutions.

AMBruno once again took their stand at the New York Art Book Fair (22nd to 24th September 2017) to exhibit the [sic] collection. Printed Matter presented 370 international presses, booksellers, artists' books, etc., presenting a diverse range of the best in contemporary art publications from 28 countries. An incredibly popular event, hugely well attended with record numbers of people passing through the venue, despite the heat outside, and subsequently inside too. Many books were sold, interesting contacts made, with great conversations and multiple questions asked.

The entire collection was acquired by the Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore. Individual books were acquired by the Art Institute of Chicago and NYPL as well as collectors at the fair.

AMBruno also presented the [sic] books at the Small Publishers' Fair (10th and 11th November 2017) at Conway Hall, Red Lion Square, London.

The entire collection was bought by the British Library.

Karen Blake - True Colours True Colours is a book of two volumes in one, with a shared spine and transparent pages. These contain flags from which you are invited to assemble the flag of your desired identity. The book's form, however, means that all that is rejected remains conjoined. Edition of 20. Indigo printing and foil blocking. Post-bound. 20 leaves of clear acetate.

Egidija Čiricaitė - people plously revere the memory History can be rewritten. Truth can change. However, the material stability of print allows ideas to transcend into the new era. This book uses language and images of spaces (now non-existent) from a 1966 Soviet book about Kaunas (Lithuania) to explore the place of voided ideas. Edition of 22. Semi-translucent light layered papers printed digitally, contained in a printed silver sleeve.

Judy Goldhill - In The Beginning This book/object relates to the biblical account of the creation of the universe. The book quotes from Genesis the Hebrew word Beresheit (in the beginning) and through its physicality and its asymmetry refers to and questions its own making. Edition of 18. Tilted book block. Black throughout except for one gold, one silver and one white page.

Rachael Hand - Ash Ash n. powdery residue left after the combustion of any substance; remains of human body after cremation. A meditation on our relationship with objects in our current era, and the question of what we will leave behind. Edition of 15. Digital print. Laser cut, etched and engraved cover. Assembled, painted and bound by hand.

Julie Johnstone - Classic Poems It is easy to make transcription errors when retyping text - whether due to human error, a slip of the eye or brain, wishful thinking, or auto-correct facilities. And then perhaps, these strangely plausible, oddly poetic, barely noticeable changes can be quietly perpetuated ... Open edition. Digitally printed. Hand bound.

Lydia Julien - Be Quite! Using photo-collages and stencilled text, Be Quite! explores the play on words, mistakes and inaccurate meaning. Known as homophones and heterographs, this stems from an argument how '40' should be written. Who was rite? I was right. Confusing, unintentionally amusing, the mistakes appear fore all two sea. Edition of 16. Paperback bound book of 24 pages.

Katarina Kelsey - 3174 m [10469.03 ft] [drillcore] 2016 is the year the International Commission on Stratigraphy declared the Anthropocene measurable in the rock; the book explores the written narrative of the earth as it was written in the year it is being re-written. Edition of 15. Linoprint in oil. 30 x 30cm pamphlet.

Sharon Kivland - A Lover's Discourse / Un discours amoureux Unsolicited 'encounter' emails, received over a year, are read as if they are intended for me alone, in a sincere desire for a real love relation, translated into English from French as they are written from my position as recipient, and with their original text. The book echoes the format of the French edition of Roland Barthes's Fragments d'un discours amoureux ("Tel Quel", Seuil 1977). Edition of 100. Digitally printed. Perfect bound. 104 pages.

John McDowall - Ellipsis Here the elided majority of the words of Heinrich Böll's story Murke's Collected Silences do not form a lacuna in the place between end and beginning, but are notionally somewhere in the space of time outside of the book's cover as the text leads out, around and back. Open edition. Cloth-covered boards and laser printed endpapers.

Steve Perfect - Degenerate A text is repeatedly copied, but the shape of the letters rather than their meaning is the source material. Contrary to nature and education I copy from right to left with my left hand. The unfamiliar hand reproduces text in a process outside writing. A book we might expect to explain and expand the statement that inspires it in fact contains a performance of the process it describes (in triplicate). Open edition. 84 pages. Colour printing. Perfect bound.

Peter Rapp - [WIMOWEH] Solomon Linda created 'Mbube' (The Lion) in 1939. Pete Seeger recorded 'Wimoweh' after (mis)hearing it. It was later appropriated and repackaged as 'The Lion Sleeps Tonight' by the pop music industry. Linda received no royalties in his lifetime; his family only started receiving royalties in 2006 after a protracted lawsuit. Edition of 20. Accordion format book of etchings.

Rachel Smith - Lines of Flight This work forces together two contradictory systems: the rhizome and the book. A drawing has been produced which follows a response to the writings of Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari in relation to the rhizome. The drawn page has then been physically fragmented, and thrust into the paginated structure of the book. First edition of 25. Digitally printed. Hand-finished books. Printed in colour. Perfect bound. 48 pages.

Cally Trench & Philip Lee - International Day At Cally's English primary school, in the early 1960s, there was an annual 'International Day', when children dressed up in a mish-mash of national costumes. Cally and Philip have re-created International Day, and readers are invited to identify the eight European countries they depict, so becoming complicit in the stereotypes. Edition of 25. Inkjet printed. Hand-sewn pamphlet.

Lena Wurz -Compartment Days A seemingly misprinted calendar and the story of a boy only visible on Thursdays. Elements of the calendar's fixed structure are jumping in and out of focus, together with Thursday boy. Edition of 12. Letterpress printing. Cover and back in translucent plastic.

Stephanie Yang - The Other Mistake Only when it is unfolded, we shall see, it is more than just a mistake. Edition of 30. Screen-print and digital print.