Yita, The Street of Plain Happyness, China, 2023

front cover

I'm going to let the artist explain what's happening here:

"For me, the Street of Plain Happiness is the traditional morning market in Northeast China.

When I was a child, I felt like I could find everything here - lots of delicious

food and lots of joy. The people running street vendors are resilient and

interesting. In the winter, with temperatures dropping to minus twenty or

thirty degrees Celsius, the morning market has hardly ever stopped for

decades.

I used an Olympus-PenF half-frame film camera to take these photos in

September 2019. In three years that followed, after many closures and

lockdowns because of COVID-19, the warmth and vibrancy faded away.

The 'street' came back after the pandemic. After surviving, I hope that

people can live peacefully in an unknown place.

The backside of the book is adorned with traditional "spring couplets'

written in calligraphy on a red background, depicting the most

representative street scene of the morning market and reflecting the

essence of urban culture. Unfolding the book on the table, the three-

dimensional street model can be formed by standing the folded paper on

both sides, presenting another perspective to tell the story of the morning

market. Folding and unfolding it, you can feel the atmosphere of the Street

of Plain Happiness, as if strolling through it."

Yita's use of this particular type of folded map has an interesting history within artists' books. This technique of depicting a street and its businesses was used most notably by Ed Ruscha in his artists' book Every Building on the Sunset Strip (1966), but there was one predecessor in a publication titled Ginza Haccho (1954) by the Japanese writer and artist Shohachi Kimura with photographs by Yoshikazu Suzuki. Its interesting to me that Yita does not address this history.

30 double-sided pages, individually 4.75" x 3.25" and when unfolded 8' 1.5"

reverse side

back cover

 

Karen M. Wirth, Cocoon, 2023

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A really interesting accordion that presents a series of photographs of rocks cocooned in a glacier in the northernmost part of Norway. Accompanying the images of rocks are a series of texts with definitions of 'cocoon.' About this piece the artists states in an endnote:

"The cocooned rocks were photographed on Spitsbergen, the largest island in the archipelago of Svalbard, Norway, between 76º46'21.13"N and 79º19'30.56"N latitudes, between June 10 and June 21, 2023. The last image is in the area of the Mayersbreen glacier."

For more about Wirth's works see: Karen M. Wirth

14 double-sided pages, individually 2.75" x 4" and when unfolded 4' 8".

reverse side with snow landscape

Erin K. Schmidt, Rust Belt, 2023, ed. 20

front cover with clasp

A small accordion that uses the 2-sided folded features of the leporello to deliver an environmental message. Below is a statement by the Schmidt about this publication:

"The Rust Belt, formerly called Steel Belt, is a region of the Northeast and Midwest United States in which the local economies specialized in large scale manufacturing of heavy industrial and consumer products. At one time considered America’s heartland, the Rust Belt began to experience industrial decline in the 1950’s and has continued to since. The elimination and outsourcing of jobs led to economic distress resulting in population decline as workers began to look elsewhere for good paying jobs.

The photos used on the front of the accordion structure as well as the cover were taken south of Detroit, Michigan along highway I-75. They are some of the remains of an era of manufacturing prosperity. The backside of the accordion structure features a photograph of the new Jeep plant in Toledo, Ohio, which continues to thrive today.

Pressed tin ornamentation became a popular and affordable element of American architecture from the 1880s to 1930s during the height of the Steel Belt manufacturing boom, and was commonly used on ceilings. The decorative book closure is reminiscent of the those pressed tin ceiling tiles commonly found in the homes of American workers who could once earn a substantial wage - enough to comfortably raise a family on a single income - at one of the many industrial plants or factories. The book closure is representative of a bygone era."

For more info about Schmidt's bookworks see: Erin K. Schmidt

13 double-sided pages, individually 4.5" x 1", and when unfolded 17"( including covers).

front

back

the two sideways views

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Laura Rowley, Gig Life: Issue 1: History, Illuminated Press, Trumanburg, New York, 2021, ed. 100

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A smart and timely zine that showcases a timeline of the gig economy and all the ramification that this exploitive system has for the workers toiling within it. Here's what Printed Matter (NY) says about this accordion: 

"Gig Life is a serial zine which investigates the Gig Economy: the shift to hiring of temporary workers, often part-time and lacking the benefits of a traditional salaried job.

How did the Gig Economy start and how does it affect workers? This zine series aims to answer these questions and others. We start here, in this first issue, with a timeline history of Gig Work, to visualize the events leading us to our present state."

17 single-sided pages, individually 4" x 2.5", when unfolded 3' 8.25"

back cover

 

David Sandlin, Belfaust Episodes 5 (Hangover Hollow), Cram Books, NY, 2023, ed 300 and Episode 6 (Alabama Nights), 2022, ed. 200, both risograph

While neither of these wonderful risograph publications are accordions, they are both distinguished by their great 4 page fold-outs to be found in the middle of each publication. With individual pages at 8" wide the center fold-outs are 2ft 8inches wide in total.

Please search this blog for a number of other great accordion publications by this Irish artist who doesn't hold anything back!

Belfaust Episode #5, Hanover Hollow: Billy Tells His Story

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Belfaust Episode #6, Alabama Nights

Motoyuki Daifu, Holy Onion, Osiris Co. Ltd, Japan, 2019

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This accordion really has to be experienced in real time — essentially its 86 pages of a woman (the artist's mother) peeling an onion, and many of the pages are blank. As you go through page by page of these very similar images, you start to get bored and then you begin to notice other things in the photographs. Your eye is drawn to an accumulation of household items piled up around the fridge behind the woman. The photos become richer as you continue, all the while witnessing his mom's discomfort as she performs her task. The activity of peeling the onion and its physical effects opens up a panoply of possible metaphors and undergirds this work with a not so subtle sense of humor.

Here's a link to a review by Olga Yatskevich's of this leporello that fills in some of the background around this book and more broadly the artists' photographic practice. Motoyuki Daifu, Holy Onion | Collector Daily

This publication is accompanied by a small booklet in both Japanese and English with a thoughtful essay by Chris Fujiwara titled "Surfaces, Agencement, Clutter."

86 single-sided pages, individually 7.75" x 5.5" and when fully onfolded 39' 5".

back cover

Guy Tillim, Petros Village, Punctum Edizioni, Rome, 2006

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A powerful photobook by this South African photographer documenting his time living in this small village in Malawi. An introductory essay by Mario Marazziti describes the DREAM project in Malawi which was fighting the scourge of AIDS in the local communities and  offering high tech molecular-biology labs for diagnosis, accompanied by education for patients, with an emphasis on educating women in order to halt the spread of neonatal AIDS. It's unclear what the connection is between the DREAM project and Petros Village, but I'm assuming Tillim's photographs illustrate the kind of rural communities that are being helped by this access to medical care for AIDS.

Here's a statement by Tillim about this project:

"Petros Village is situated in central Malawi, about 50 kilometres north of the capital Lilongwe. Rural, but not remote, the villagers rely on a local market for the sale of tobacco and beans for cash, and grow maize as a staple food. In 2004 the rains didn’t fall and their crops failed, but a famine was averted because the Italian Trust, Sant’Egidio Community, assisted them among others. This year, as in all years, they face the same engagement with the climate, an opportunistic and precarious existence, with an uncertain harvest.

Petros Village takes its name from its chief, Petros James. In accordance with Chewa law he inherited the chieftainship not from his father, but from his uncle, his mother’s brother. The son of his sister Neri will inherit the title from Petros, and take his name, just as Petros did from his uncle. As Petros said, the sons and daughters of your sister are your real relatives; your real home is where your mother comes from.

I met Petros with Dr Piero Bestagini and Moses Chigona from the Sant’Egidio feeding centre and laboratory at nearby Mtengawantenga. Within a few minutes of meeting him, he had agreed that I could spend a week in the village. Dr Piero asked where I would stay and without hesitation Petros took us to his homestead and showed us his sleeping quarters. He and his wife would move into the room where they prepare food.

It is only a day or two later that I realised the significance of this concession. The hospitality I’ve received is so open-handed, so otherworldly, that it’s almost impossible to imagine in the place I come from. I try to place it, this generosity of spirit. I think of traditional rural hospitality, custom, and things time-honoured and unmolested by city life. But the sense of it is elusive, muted by my prejudice, obscured by my ignorance.

The sun is setting, hiatus before the deep village dark, a whispering group of children gather around me in the twilight just to stare."

72 single-sided pages, individually 8.5" x 6.25" and fully opened 37' 6"

back cover