Unique Publishing Object Studio

Unique Publishing Object Studio – build. E, 9 Wolnica Str., room 53A
acting Head: dr. Marcin Lorenc ad.

Studio programme:

Of the various tools used by man, the most surprising, without a doubt, is the book. The others are extensions of his body. The microscope and telescope are extensions of sight, the telephone an extension of the voice; then we have the plough and the sword – extensions of the arm. Only the book is something completely different: the book is an extension of memory and imagination.

Jorge Luis Borges

The studio’s program assumes action on the border between art and craft, knowledge and practice, physical space and autonomous space of imagination. In order to create an object, knowledge and a set of practical skills are needed. The object is created first as an idea and a set of possibilities of its implementation, which finally materialize in a certain form, which is the result of many factors such as: time, technique, creativity, knowledge, commitment and chance.

Thinking in terms of the publishing object goes beyond the typical idea of ​​what a book is. It provokes and encourages us to search for and experience what it could be and what it could not be. Jorge Luis Borges claims that: „The very possibility of a book being is enough for it to become a being”, for Jacques Derrida a book is only a „theoretical potentiality”.

The unique publishing object has a strong connection with the spatial form, goes beyond the framework of the book and is situated on the border between: the art book, sculpture, installation. As an art object, it establishes and maintains the relationship between what is „historical” and what is current and new in artistic research. Examples of such activities are both Hyakumantō Darani from the 8th century and La Boîte-en-Valise by Marcel Duchamp. The foundation of the conducted classes are presentations and workshops covering, among others: the history and characteristics of traditional Eastern bookbinding, making traditional Asian books, alternative methods of bookbinding in the context of creating independent forms of artistic publications, learning paper decoration techniques, paper spatial forms, familiarization with writing materials preceding the invention of paper, the ability to work with the risograph and its application in the implementation of artistic projects. As a result, students gain tools to search for creative solutions both in the traditions of the East and the West, in history and modernity, in the area of ​​art and technology.

The development of the above technological issues and the main goal of the studio is to implement artistic projects based on the given topics. Consultations play an important role in their implementation, the aim of which is to support students in all aspects related to the implementation of their works. An important group of proposed activities is also the implementation of low-volume, unique and personal artistic publications (zines, multiples, exhibition books, etc.). Editability – creating not a single work, but in many copies, is related to the issue of duplication, and then to adapting the strategy of implementing one’s own works so that they can be duplicated. The use of a digital duplicator (Risograph) is a very important, although not the only, component of the implementation of this assumption, which complements activities in the area of ​​drawing and painting.