As the title of my book is not in English, I need to order a custom plate in order to emboss my cover. I spoke to the binder about this last week, and he said that I’d need to create a black and white PDF, to scale, of the artwork. This then gets sent off to South Australia, and sent back in about 3 days. Today I emailed the above artwork to the binder. I wondered if the characters are thick enough for a successful emboss, so I have asked his opinion on this as well. At the moment I am planning to either have it embossed but not filled with colour (blind? - I can’t remember the exact terminology) or perhaps a light grey / white.

For my exhibition prints, I am planning to print some large scale collage pieces that hand down from the wall loosely (ie: only pinned at the top.) Today I did the first trial of these. I think 6 would look great, so I made 6 different ones. I tried to do this loosely without over thinking anything, as I wanted them to feel loose and organic. I plan to print these roughly 24x50”. Initially I wanted them to be longer, but this shape matched the ratio of a mobile phone screen, so I thought it better tied in to the idea of communicating digitally.

Above are two variations of how I might sequence them. Of course, these are not the final pieces yet, so this is likely to change. I spoke to the printers this week and settled on a paper stock, so the next step is to do some test prints. Luckily, I’m familiar with the stock I’ve chosen as I’ve printed on it numerous times before. I’m going with quite a standard stock, because I want them to be a little rough, as this suits the rest of the project too.

Thick card cover

Perspex cover

More formal bind

The box- the clasp is a piece of bone.

Opening the box

Fully opened box

Now that we are allowed to travel more than 5km from our home, I was finally able to visit the Melbourne School of Book Binding to have a look at some binding samples. I had been in contact with Phil via email, and he was absolutely brilliant to chat to. He was very helpful and had some great suggestions for my book. After talking to him and showing him my mock-up books, we decided on a firm card cover, lined with grey, so that it will protect the pages but still have some bend to it. It will be stitched with grey thread, and have 2 ribbons attached to the back to replicate bookmarks that often appear in journals (there will be 2 to represent myself and Shinya.) We also talked about making a small box to keep the book in, and I though this looked fantastic. But, if I was to have this box I would probably choose a different cover for the book itself. And, I’d like the clasp to be a Japanese coin (the 5 yen coin, as it has a hole in the middle and is for good luck.) But I am not sure if I will go for the box or not yet.

Some feedback that I received earlier in the week was to replace all of the telephone pole images with images of cell towers. I liked this idea because I didn’t feel that the telephone poles really fit in to the book, but I did like the idea of what they represented. The cell towers were perfect though, because they facilitate the internet, which is how I communicate with my partner. So I went on a mission to photograph every cell tower within a 5km radius of my house (there are still restrictions on travel distance in place due to COVID.) There were apparently 7 towers within this radius, so I jumped in my car and started driving around to photograph them. Some of them were hard to access, so I ended up driving in loops around them until I could get close, then had to get out and treck to their bases. It felt very shady, but was also exciting! I think that the cell towers actually fit in well with the rest of the work, so I am glad that I was able to capture lots of them this day. (Also, they are all so unique in their shapes- I found that quite interesting.)

I had a lot of leftover prints from my mock-up (the printer accidentally printed multiples of some pages) so I decided to make some really loose collages. I felt a bit like I was in high school art class again. I tried not to think about anything too much and just cut/stick/stitch as I felt. I actually don’t mind a couple of the final results, but I don’t think they tie in with my main photo book closely enough, as the style is a lot different. They might be interesting printed as large scale images and displayed side by side.

Here are some photos of my workspace that day…

I’m getting closer to my final product, and I hadn’t made a physical mock up since mid-year assessment, so I thought I should make another one. Since the last physical book, the page count has increased almost x 4, so this time around it was very thick! I printed the book in signatures this time, because there was no way it would be able to be folded and saddle stitched like the last mock up. Printing in signatures was a little tricky because I had to work out how to correctly export from InDesign, and then had to fold all the signatures. Because the narrative of the book is quite jumbled, and I have not memorised the order yet, I had to do this very carefully.

It took me 1 evening and 1 morning to bind the book, but I found it really relaxing. Unfortunately, half way through the morning session I accidentally started binding upside-down, so I had to remover 5 or 6 signatures and attach them again. I used this YouTube video as a guide when stitching the book.

The final product!

I was happy with the final result (even though the stitching at the top and bottom edges was a bit loose) and I think it helps give a better idea of the physicality of the final product. I also made a simple cover using some grey cover paper, but this was mostly to demonstrate how the book will attach to the cover, rather than what the actual cover will look like. I want the real cover to be heavier, perhaps a board or linen, and be embossed with the title, つながり

Some updates on inspirations for printing! I have decided to definitely follow the style of Michal Iwanowski’s Clear Of People for the binding. I will still bind it on the right had side, as is traditional in Japan, and use Swiss binding, so that the stitching is exposed. I also plan to have a section at the back of the book that provides explanations of some of the images (eg: the coffee cups with COVID case numbers.) I plan to print this on a different stock, if possible. I am thinking that I’d like it to be a pastel pink, and thinner that the rest of the book. I actually found a book that incorporates exactly what I was thinking of - Out of the Blue by Virginie Rebetez. 

I’ve been taught that there is a limit to how many visual approaches you can successfully incorporate into a project, and I have definitely exceeded that limit. Today I counted how many different approaches I have included in Tsunagari, as well as how many of each of those are present. In this case, I think the excessive number of elements actually adds to the chaos of the narrative, and reflects my mentality throughout this period of separation. I have really enjoyed the looseness of this project, in comparison to the very precise, specific commercial work that I have produced in the past.

Today I played around with exhibition presentations, which included making this mock up in Photoshop. Yan Gross’ presentation of his series ’The Jungle Book’ was the main inspiration. In actual fact, I used a photograph of his install and pasted my images over the top to get a feel for how they would look. I think I came across Gross’ work in May or so this year, and I have had this style of presentation on my mind ever since. I think that it suits my project well, because it is a mish-mash of different sizes and display styles, which replicates the many visual approaches I have used in my work. The use of both framed images and vinyl transfers is very effective in adding visual interest as well as depth. Of course, this display solution would be suitable for a solo exhibition, but may not work so well in a group show.

Just as a bit of fun, and to get a feel for how my images will look in a 3D form, I made this quick digital mock up of the book. I think it’s going to come out really well. I kind of like the warmth of the paper in this mockup- I think it feels a bit more ‘diary-like’ than having an ultra-white stock. So I’ll probably explore warmer stock when it comes to printing.