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The Dream of the Dirty Woman

Item date(s): 1980

Elka Schumann
Claire Van Vliet  - (book artist)


Pages: 10pp
Size: 330mm
Edition: #18/45

Sub-type: Private press

Place publication: West Burke, VT
Publisher: The Janus Press

Additional notes:
Balilisk Catalogue 3: "Janus Press, West Burke, Vermont. One of the most respected American presses, owned by Claire van Vliet. Her stylish books are superbly crafted. Item 205. The dream, which has a happy ending, is about a woman caught during the French Revolution who escapes from the Bastille wearing the white dress of those sent to the guillotine. She rolls in the mud to dirty its dazzle and - well, as I said, it has a happy ending summoned by wedding bells. Originally written as a one-act play by Elka Schumann for the Bread and Puppet Theatre in Vermont. The first performance, with music on krumhorns, recorders, lutes and other early instruments, was recorded and the record accompanies the illustrated text, printed as a folding frieze. Folded, the frieze is the same size as the record jacket - about 12 inches square; unfolded, ten times its length. The paper was made at Twinrocker's hand made paper mill in Indiana in grey with areas of yellow and brown incorporated to form part of the images. Thus the white being ink and the yellow, paper. Types, Franklin Gothic and Trump Mediaeval, printed grey, black and brown. The whole protected by a box covered in cloth printed grey on gray."

A play in one act based on a dream of Elka Schumann with a record of the performance. Bread and Puppet Theatre. The illustrations are relief plates made by Claire Van Vliet who, with Kathryn Clark, made the paper at Twinrocker Handmade Paper Mill in Brookston, Indiana. The type is Franklin Gothic and Trump Mediaeval with old brass and wood type. 85 copies of which 45 are press numbered. Fold-out accordian in patterned slipcase.

Illustrated on page 125 of Fine Print, Volume 7, Number 4, 1981 and reviewed on page 126.

Illustrated on page 89 of The Book as Art, Artists' Books from the National Museum of Women in the Arts, 2006.

Illustrated in Joshua Heller Rare Books Catalogue #37, 2009, Item 43.

Illustrated on page 16 of Masters: Book Arts, curated by Eileen Wallace, 2011.

Illustrated in Text as Inspiration: Artists' Books and Literature, National Gallery of Art, Washington DC, 2011.

Ref: GB/5708



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