Pairings

Location: The Library at Leeds Arts University, Blenheim Walk, Leeds LS2 9AQ

This exhibition is available to view from 10:00am-4:00pm Monday to Saturday by appointment only for external visitors. To arrange a visit, please email  libraryadmin@leeds-art.ac.uk. Staff and students are not required to make an appointment.

The Fine Art Artist Book and Print Collective is a group of students and staff at Leeds Arts University who are keen to expand their practices into artist books, printmaking and other opportunities to collaborate and disseminate their work in different ways.

The group sought out a selection of artist books from the university library’s Special Collection that offered examples of collaborative coordination of content and/or design, group contributions responding to a theme, or fine artists collaborating. They were drawn to the Artists’ Book Exchange: First Anniversary Edition, a project set up by artist Patricia Collins, whereby a number of global artists on the register for the Artist Book Exchange were posted a blank, handmade book (made from used, brown envelopes), asked to work into the book and then to return it to Collins. This resulted in a series of eighty-eight books, which were exhibited at Speck Studios, London in November 1996 – January 1997 as part of an exhibition of contemporary artists’ books titled ‘By its Cover’.

The Fine Art Artist Book and Print Collective at Leeds Arts University has now responded to the diverse editions from the original eighty-eight artists and, to an extent, revived the timeless approach taken by the project thirty years ago. Presented here are new creations from six members of the Collective alongside their chosen books from the Artists’ Book Exchange: First Anniversary Edition.