Guest post: I love books!

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By ronnie from art and etc.

I come from Sams Creek, which is an itty-bitty little place on the far south coast of NSW, Australia. The entire (human) population of Sams Creek consists of myself, my partner and our two kids- we live on a large (by our area's standard) farm and do all manner of farm activities but mostly I'm known as the-mad-lady-with-all-the-books...... or rather... the-mad-lady-who-DOES-MAD-THINGS-with-all-the-books

Rhonda Ayliffe - 'ars gratia artis'
carved copy of my old high school art textbook

Oh dear, I think I can hear the sound of book-lovers the world over starting to hyperventilate... maybe you should look away now - 'cause this is what I get up to....

Rhonda Ayliffe - 'Fahrenheit 451'
ephemeral sculpture/photography

OK - maybe I should explain. Nothing inherently valuable gets my mad-book-lady treatment. Indeed I make most of my work from unwanted books, discarded and destined for the trash pile (and that means mostly old encyclopaedias, out-dated textbooks or atlases, and cheap paperback romances)
Are you feeling a bit better yet? Well, how about if I tell you that I buy these from charities that would otherwise have to pay to have them carted off to landfill? Well that always makes me feel better!

Aside from some of the more destructive 'fiery' things I make (or maybe it's better described as 'un-make') I also like to put books back together again...

Rhonda Ayliffe - 'serpens volumen - arcus pluvius'
(the rainbow serpent book)
this is a very very loooooong coptic-bound book,
made from a whole heap of old science year books

The truth is I really love books, and love love LOVE all the crafts associated with their creation: calligraphy, letterpress, paper crafts, bookbinding, collage, marbling, photography, printmaking... and I like to play around with these and a whole lot more in all sorts of ways - but I'd love to come back and tell another tale on another day.
In the meantime, if you love book arts you might like to check out Artists Books 3.0 - a place 'where artists' books and the book arts meet online', and here is my AB 3.0 page (be warned.... there's a whole lot more pics of books getting the mad-book-lady treatment!)

cheers from Sams Creek - ronnie x