Kickstarter Tribute to Library of Congress Rare Books Expert Mark Dimunation

A new Kickstarter project has been launched to pay tribute to Mark Dimunation who retired as Chief of Rare Books at the Library of Congress at the end of March. It has been created by Ian Kahn, co-founder of Lux Mentis, Booksellers, in collaboration with book artist Timothy Ely.

Dimunation has been in post for 25 years and the Kickstarter aims to raise money to place the artist book Bones of the Book by Ely, a volume Dimunation has been keen to add to the significant collection of contemporary artists books he has built up since 1998, in the Library of Congress in his name.

Here is how Ely describes his work: "Bones of the Book reflects both my identity as a maker of things, and bones as structural supports, and how that metaphor maps itself onto the cultural object/artifact of the book. As parts of the book traditionally have names of body parts to identify the book terrain, this seems apt. Books have a dorsal structure—a spine—and just as in a humanoid, if this is damaged the book is compromised. A book has a head and tail, and sometimes this head is crowned in gold, gilded, or otherwise given an ornamental treatment. As the names of a book’s parts and their function lend connection to bones and anatomy, so also does the chosen structure of this book."

The project aims to raise $100,000 to cover the cost of the book (which will include the names of all contributors) and anything above that will be used to establish a fund for the acquisition of additional artist books/book arts for the Library of Congress in Mark's name.

More details about the project here.