Book 51.  Reacting to Renee I. Leslie, R and Penn C.  (2009) (Fig. 50). Reacting to Renee I.  Unique collaborative  artist’s book. Drawing, Digital prints, text, sewing. 25 pages.  30cm x 26.5cm x 3.5cm. Book 51. Collection: Renee Leslie.

Leslie is an artist who is well known for her drawing skills.  When I approached her to do a collaborative book with me, she was doubtful, but agreed.  She gave me twenty five drawings of figures in various poses.  Single figures, figures in groups, standing figures and walking figures,  drawn in a variety of methods.  My initial reaction was that the images were visually simple  and I could not feel the presence of the artist. I reacted by making  complex digital print images.  These small prints consisted of   previous artworks I had made, overlaid with books I had made, photographs I had taken and self portraits.

On further reflection, I found some of the drawings  to be quite melancholy, with a large number of them showing only the backs of people. I addressed what I felt to be quite an emotional reaction to the images with letters to Leslie, typed on the back of the digital prints.   I folded the edges of the paper to make pockets into which the letters were inserted.  Following on from the results of Book 53 (Reacting to Renee (OMNIBUS)),  Leslie again interacted with the pages, using some of my drawn and painted images as collage to push the aesthetics of the book further.

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