SONNET XVIII, bound in paper
Versie
The book, bound in paper, limited edition. The book is offset printed on Hahnemuhle Ingres paper, 90 gram in a edition of 65 books. The content of the book is a collaboration between Marja Wilgenkamp and La Societe Anonyme. The binding of the paper edition was carried out by Elbel Libro to a design by Marja Wilgenkamp.
It is a Dos rapporté binding with split boards covered in So Silk paper.
The words ‘Shakespeare’ and ‘Sonnet XVIII’ were laser cut into the boards, inspired by the lace edging on costumes during Shakespeare’s time.
This style of lettering is repeated on the front and back endpaper flyleaves.
ISBN 978-90-9027222-1
Sonnet XVIII, bound in wood. Sold out.
Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm’d;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm’d;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander’st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this and this gives life to thee.
A breath of life, Sonnet XVIII read and recorded, protected from bitrot, software decay and hardware failure via a transformation from magnetic transitions on a disk to ink on paper.
About
XVIII is a project by La Société Anonyme and Marja Wilgenkamp who generated the spark that started this project.
La Société Anonyme created the concept; the
recording of the sonnet and the encoding into binary
information,
making the book accessible for future,
potentially post-apocalypse, post-computer, humans.
The book
The book is offset printed on Hahnemuhle Ingres paper, 90/95 gram in a edition of 70 books. 5 books are bound by hand in a wooden cover and are protected in a clamshell box with a wooden portrait of Shakespeare.
The wooden books are sold out.
28 books are bound by hand in paper in the Dos rapporté structure as developed by Benjamin Elbel
Special Thanks
I owe a debt of gratitude to Hannah Kockx who provided the beautiful polymer etching and who invaluably gave me a greater understanding of Shakespeare’s sonnets.
I would like to thank actor Hugo Koolschijn. He did the declamation of the sonnet, I thank his generosity.
Thanks to Jaap Borra for the beautiful realisation of the woodwork of the book and his help with the portrait of Shakespeare for the box.
Id Laser for the laserwork of books and portrait.
I am grateful to Kieke Schaaper whose editing skills helped to complete the content of the book, who made the whole book ready for printing and who helped with the technical drawings for the lasercutting.
I also want to thank offsetprinter Jan de Jong and his team for their great help by printing this book.
I also thank Benjamin Elbel for forwarding the paper version of the book.
La Société Anonyme is an artist’s collective born from the ashes of the Dutch 2013 funding cuts to the arts.
An avant-garde art collective with a corporate twist après la lettre, La Société Anonyme launches its first product in July 2012: The SKOR Codex.
A book preserving the legacy of one of the Netherlands’ perishing art organisations for the distant future.
Adopting an experimental model of artistic corporation, La Société Anonyme responds to the commodification of culture by searching for alternative ways to make, promote and sustain art.
La Société Anonyme is represented by Dušan Barok, Danny van der Kleij, Aymeric Mansoux and Marloes de Valk.
More info at: Societeanonyme.la
Marja Wilgenkamp is a professional bookbinder based in Blokker, The Netherlands.
Since 1997 Boekbinderij Wilgenkamp has specialised in producing unique books for individuals, companies and professional organisations.
Marja Wilgenkamp’s previous career as a textile instructor gives her a distinct perspective on design and the use of materials that she employs to effect in her bindings.
Her work is held in private collections and The Royal Library in The Hague.
Her studio also offers courses, workshops and since 2011 masterclasses taught by renowned bookbinders from France. Sweden, Switserland, Spain, Germany USA and the UK.
