And yet, texts are often transformed by their material packaging. Text in the abstract may seem like an immutable and unassailable idea. I think my purpose for being here is to always be thinking about how materiality and the medium shapes the message. I am always trying to think, ‘What have we been drawing on historically? What are we missing examples of?’ I really want to help connect students, researchers and faculty with material objects in our collections that's really important to me. The duties of my job are to build the collections through gift and purchase. This interview has been edited and condensed. Just like the exhibition, the following Q&A with Frengel reveals there are no easy answers when it comes to the nature of books. The best entry will have the chance to be curator for a day. Participants who submit a 100 word-essay that answers the question “What is a book?” will win a prize from Special Collections. Visitors will also be able to voice their opinions in an essay contest. No matter what path you go down, you’ll find an example that proves and disproves your choice.” “But this choose-able path format breaks large questions down into manageable chunks. “It’s easy to say, ‘I don’t know’ to these very meta questions,” said Kaufman. The exhibition poses a series of questions: “Does a book need to have pages? Does a book need text?” Each decision sends visitors down a different path, a concept developed by exhibition designer Chelsea Kaufman. But are either of these books? It’s up to you to decide.
Those objects range from a clay tablet made in the 3rd century BCE to a modern audiobook.
0 kommentar(er)
