New York's Center for Book Arts (CBA) gathered together an engaging overview of works for its Book Arts in the USA exhibition, which premiered in New York in 1990 and now tours internationally, through the auspices of the Arts America program of the United States Information Agency (USIA). The USIA's guidelines stipulate no additional U.S. venues and prohibit sale of the exhibition's color catalogue in this country. Sale of this video is allowed only as a membership premium. Unless you caught the New York showing or you live in a country hosting the exhibition, this 28- minute videotape is the best available option for viewing the fifty-one works by U.S. artists. Our video host is the ubiquitous Richard Minsky, who founded CBA in 1974, curated this exhibition, and was the driving force behind the First [sic] National Book Arts Conference in 1990. This conference was held in New York City and was highlighted by the opening of this exhibition. In the video Minsky is subtly garbed (for him) in a gray suit with bow tie (I first met Minsky several years ago as he swept into CBA in a greatcoat and a beaver hat). The videotape is roughly organized into three sections. Minsky begins in CBA's gallery, gesturing to books in display cases and then walking through CBA's workshops, as he muses, In this era of satellite communications and computers, what draws so many people to use traditional tools and processes to communicate? Is it the seduction of materials? The portability of the medium? For every person the answer is different, so let's go back into the gallery, and let each of the artists speak to us through their work. This is our first indication that Minsky's comments will be directed to a general audience. Viewers who have long inhabited the book arts realm should not expect theoretical reflection in this presentation, but will find visual delights awaiting in Minsky's "oh, gee!" approach to looking at a variety of books. Minsky continues to prepare the way for the general viewer, commenting that literacy in the book arts encompasses visual as well as textual content. He adds that time constraints do not allow a reading of each book, but that, "you will be amazed at how much of the content comes across as I show each one to you." For the most part Minsky delivers on this promise, even though the videotape medium naturally favors visual over textual content. For the remainder of the presentation, with a few exceptions, Minsky stands behind a gray table and in front of a gray wall. He examines books from the exhibition which are laid out before him, and every few minutes a new group of books appears, awaiting our perusal. Minsky begins this second section with a rather rushed and selective historical summary of the book form, touching upon the book's metamorphoses from Egyptian scrolls, to Coptic bindings, etc. He holds up exhibited books as illustrations. His introductory comments last only about four minutes and could have proved intriguing had he chosen to examine parallels in historic vs. contemporary formats in more depth. Still, I forgave his brevity since I was eager to look more closely at each of the exhibited books. This historical context establishes a precedent for artists' books to the uninitiated viewer. From history, then, Minsky segues smoothly into a commentary on each book. As Minsky works his way through the books, he sometimes alludes to themes uniting his groupings of the works, such as books which share political content, or a primarily textual presentation, or letterpress technology. But, for the most part, Minsky rightly presents the books to us in looser groupings, an informal approach that emphasizes each individual work rather than a distracting curatorial thesis. The suitability of videotape for demonstrating artists' books is repeatedly underlined as Minsky manipulates each book. Naturally, the books that show to best advantage are those whose content keys off of movement, and a viewer new to the book arts will no doubt delight in movable works like Hedi Kyle's exciting ABC flag book, or Susan Kae Grant's three witty flip books, The Wink, The Kiss, The Slap. Sculptural works are enlivened by Minsky's touch, as well: Martha Carothers alters a found textbook well-known to art students in Munsell@. She refutes the codification of color principles in the Munsell Student Set by spilling streamers of color free of the book. When Minsky departs from his straightforward presentation, the results are striking, such as when part of a Susan Share performance is spliced in to demonstrate her concerns with space, movement, and sound. At another point we view, unsuspecting, Mindell Dubansky's The Crown Jewels, the artist's humorous response to the crown jewels exhibit in the Tower of London. Her crown jewels are small books, gold- tooled with the royal crest, made into earrings and a necklace; the camera pans up to reveal Minsky sporting one of the earrings along with the necklace. The video could have incorporated a few more movement-based illustrations and witticisms, to offset the inevitable repetition involved in examining so many bookworks. CBA's video instructs us not only on the work of the featured artists, but also on the pros and cons of videotape as a medium for reportage and documentation. Book arts organizations have long wished to invest in videotape equipment. For those of us who view books in cases, including those of us who struggle to exhibit the book's three-dimensional character under such constraints, the pluses of a videotape are apparent. Ideally, book exhibitions of the future will include a videotape component adjacent to the gallery, where viewers can sit back and study books as they are paged. The most effective videotape that I have viewed in such a setting accompanied the Cooper- Hewitt Museum's 1987 exhibition Surprise! Surprise! Pop- up and Movable Books. That soundless video ran continuously in the gallery and showed each exhibited book as it was opened and paged through. It did not detract from the physical works on show, but did offer the patient viewer an opportunity to view each work in its entirety. Having praised the strengths of this video in illustrating movement-based and sculptural works, I must acknowledge that its weakness lies in doing justice to textually-based works. Minsky's thirty seconds per book allows us only the binding and a glimpse of one page opening for letterpress-printed beauties such as Harry Duncan's subtle Voyage to Cythera. I advise the viewer to keep the pause button handy, to give more time to these typographical masterworks, which include unbound pages from Kim Merker's stunning Manhattan, and Andrew Hoyem's Captivity Narrative of Hannah Dustin. My guess is that the audiences who would benefit most from this videotape would be educational institutions offering book-related classes, arts organizations which support work in the book form, and supporters of CBA eager to expand their book arts library into video. Repeated viewing reveals a few irritating attributes: for example, once or twice the microphone slips down into view; and I began to wonder just what Minsky was looking at when his eyes periodically strayed off to one side. But these are small errors, and they certainly do not interfere with a first-time viewer's excitement at this book arts extravaganza. Overall, the video work is straightforward and non-intrusive, and intersperses close-ups of each book with group shots. For a first effort, CBA offers us a solid introduction to a selection of work by leading artists. Minsky ends our book arts tour with this adieu, "We have seen that books are still developing and evolving after thousands of years. Perhaps you will look at books a little differently, and maybe you've been inspired to make one." For the next CBA video, especially one directed toward a general audience, as is this one, I suggest that some additional commentary on sources for buying artists' books be included with the packaging. Any collector would benefit from a list of the precious few outlets for acquiring works in edition, as well as national organizations for budding book artists. Until then, let us wish a long and fruitful life for Center for Book Arts' Book Arts in the USA videotape, and may the production of these kinds of videotapes grow and multiply, and add the record of movement to other forms of book arts documentation. Betty Bright

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