Have you seen those images of incredibly detailed sculptural book art being pinned and re-pinned all over Pinterest? They are crazy! Don’t you wonder how they were created? I do mixed media, altered book art, but my work can’t compare to this craziness!
TED has a video featuring the work of artist Brian Dettmer, who carves sculptures from outdated encyclopedias, textbooks and dictionaries. 
So how does Dettmer create these incredible works of book art? First he seals the outer edges of the book with heavy varnish, then he starts cutting into the pages, like an excavator or archeologist. It’s that simple (ha, ha). He’s got to have some mighty sharp Exacto blades. I once hollowed out a book for hiding things — it took forever, and it wasn’t the cleanest set of cuts either. What blew my mind was learning that Dettmer doesn’t really know what he’s going to find. That, and everything you see in his finished pieces came from the pages of the book. Nothing was added.
Dettmer’s view of books is fascinating. Many people think of books as living things that they can’t bear to to destroy, but he takes it a step further — he sees them as living things that can grow.
When he cuts into books, he thinks about images, and what new works of art he can create from them, but he also thinks about the text within. He’s fascinated by the idea that when we read, we create images in our minds. Similarly, as we look at images, we use language to understand the images.
Dettmer sees himself as discovering the hidden potentials in a book, maximizing and exposing it in this new work. In this way, the oldest form of knowledge, the book, can be repurposed into beautiful art.
I appreciate that he doesn’t think the internet or eReaders will replace the book form. He reminds us that people once said painting would die when photography was invented, and that certainly didn’t happen. So go ahead. Cut up an old book.
You can watch Brian Dettmer and see more before and after photos of his work on TED here.
