{From making edges glow to testing the flip of a flip book.}
Everything of late, it interlocks, as we prepare for the Melbourne Art Book Fair in the Great Hall at the NGV. Nine new zine titles and three (limited edition and unique state) artists’ books are all in various states of completion. Towers of drying, Almost There and Really, Really, Almost There dot the landscape of our home-based studio between which pets weave. Drawings on individual pages are cut, curved and sanded, their edges made gold. Pets sleep. Pets leap. Zine spines are coated with twelve layers of glue. Pets leap. Pets sleep. Scoring. Folding. Signing. Tweaking. Our only niggle with the days of late: that they are soon to draw to a close. In this beautifully blinkered state all else drops away. And the pets sleep on. Bliss. With a frenzied intensity to it. Bliss.
+ Olive's cat fort of zines.
+ Lottie perfects the Art of Cat.
+ The Tortoise dreams of being able to glue the spines of Whiskers and Bristles at the speed of a Hare, but with accuracy.
{Precarious towers of zines as they dry and bookbinding components are given the rub of approval.}
{In the last of the light, taking shape.}
{The Dear Tails production line is, rather suitably, flanked by sleeping soundly pets.}
{Olive as Tower (of Zines, Drying).}
{Fittingly, a closer look at several new characters from our artists' book, Closer to Natural.}
{Thirteen animals from Closer to Natural ready to be fixed, cut, sanded, and trimmed with gold paint.}
{A quartet of new zines (Seasonal Museum Sketches (Spring and Summer), Wrens, flycatchers, and honeyeaters, beware, and Afternoon of a Hopping mouse (Notomys mitchellii) will be released into the wild at the #NGVABF and our online store at the end of April.)}
{Happiness is seeing (our) animals drawn from the collection return to the collection. (Image credit: @museumvictoria, @melbournemuseum)}
{Whiskers and Bristles waits to be made whole}
{Handwriting 'Whiskers and Bristles' 90-odd times, I can no longer recall with ease where the 't' in 'bristles' goes.}
{Lottie and her assistant, Louise, check the proofs and give the green light.}
{Little dog; big factory. Taking it all in her stride, like Perce, as the guillotine slices through tower after tower of soon-to-be zines.}
{From these parts will come three titles: Cutting the Collection and Thumb Through (featuring the Performing Arts Collection) and Whiskers and Bristles (featuring components from our forthcoming artists' book, Because I Like You).}
{'Psittacula wardi,' 'Atelopus zeteki,' 'Eretmochelys imbricata,' and 'Mustela erminea' might be fun to say, but they're Devils to hand write.}
{Olive's cat fort varies from day to day. #theworkingtable}
{Four (of nine) new zine titles, Whiskers and Bristles, Closer to Natural, Cutting the Collection, and Thumb Through, ready for the fair.}
This time next week, the National Gallery of Victoria's Melbourne Art Book Fair will be in full flight. We hope to see you there!
Melbourne Art Book Fair
Great Hall, NGV, 180 St Kilda Rd.
Friday 29th April
10am–6pm International Symposium on the Future of Design for Publishing (ticketed event)
6–10pm Melbourne Art Book Fair Preview (ticketed event)
Saturday 30th April
10am–8pm
Melbourne Art Book Fair (free)
Sunday 1st May
10am–5pm
Melbourne Art Book Fair (free)
