Monday, April 27, 2009

Lovely little bookies

The two books I want to share today were birthday presents from BSharp, all the way from old Amsterdam. The first one, Tight Fit (edition one) is a full colour saddle stitched A5 zine, with fine production values, and even finer pictures. Put together by Sarah Lippett (www.crayonlegs.com) and featuring the work of 9 other contributors, this little book is a brief, stylish, lighthearted, visually confident and silly exploration of the beard (well facial hair, but mostly beards). My favourite part is the section on 'literal facial hair'- with pictures of a man with actual mutton chops perched on either cheek, bicycle handlebars as mustouche.. you get the idea. The colour is fun and this with the slick and 'now' illustration style makes it very readable and easy to engage with in a way that B&W, 'made on the work copier' publications often don't manage (though I know old skool zinesters would think me missing the point of the genre for saying so).

The next little book is It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks, a slightly smaller than DL sized art book with no words, each page featuring a colourful monster face. The images look like they've been done with water colours and maybe gouche and are deliciously contorted and full of character. I like the detil in the faces andthe way that they look a little awkward and unslick. The detail and use of colour in each image is really quite beautiful. Sourced to www.billdunlap.com

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