Top drawer of box contains SUMO GEISHA SASHIM and COLOPHON & INSTRUCTIONS FOR VIEWING, the latter on a folded card, numbered and signed by the artist.

FLOATING BRIDGE OF DREAMS:490 x 290mm, #3/10. 2014. The colophon is separate from the book.

The box measures 540 310 x 80mm and has two drawers with handles and decorated sides.

INSTRUCTIONS FOR VIEWING

• The two books in this project, SUMO GEISHA SASHIMI and FLOATING BRIDGE OF DREAMS, should be viewed in place - inside their drawers - after the drawers are removed from the box.

• A wooden stand is attached in the top drawer - the spine of SUMO GEISHA SASHIMI fits between the slots of the stand and then the book is opened.

• After removing the bottom drawer from the box the book FLOATING BRIDGE OF DREAMS is opened while remaining inside the drawer. The left wall of the drawer performs a similar function as the slots of the wooden stand in the top drawer.

IDEAS / INDEX / COLOPHON

All the photographs (except two images downloaded from the Library of Congress website), digital collages, design, prepress, printing, and binding are by me, Brad Freeman. The printing of the two books is either offset on the Heidelberg GTO with Mohawk Superfine and Astrobrite black or inkjet on the Epson 9800 with Asuka kozo paper. All the printing was done at the Center for Book and Paper, Columbia College Chicago, in 2012 and 2013. The binding and box/drawer construction were completed in 2014 at my studio in Chicago.

Most of the photographs for this project were taken while on a trip to Japan in 2011 with my wife Yukie Kobayashi. A few photographs from Chicago, Portugal, and Newfoundland are included.

The two books are bound using the traditional Japanese stab binding. However, the presentation strategies of the images diverge radically from one another in each book. The books share a certain attitude, a way of looking at the worl - —basically what I’ve done is take photographs and form them into collage sequences that express my own psychological viewpoint while making use of the constraints of the codex.

SUMO GEISHA SASHIMI consists of two sequences - on each verso page a single photograph of a sumo match is repeated over and over through all the pages while zooming in on a solitary detail - one moment of time is displayed as the view comes closer and closer to a particular detail of the larger photograph on each subsequent page. In a complementary manner, a sequence of photographs taken during a period of about twenty minutes is presented on all the recto pages. The intention was to take advantage of the book’s verso/recto form and create a correspondence among the images across the gutter and through the pages that would not have been possible if each sequence was presented alone.

A visual poem, FLOATING BRIDGE OF DREAMS is a presentation of images arranged in such a way as to provide associations and enhance their meaning as the pages are turned with an ineluctable drive toward the end. The title comes from a phrase used in The Tale of Genji by Shikibu Murasaki. Three kinds of paper - Mohawk Superfine, Asuka kozo, and Astrobrite black - were used as a way to explore the possibilities of various offset and inkjet printing techniques. Also, the different weight, drape, and texture of the papers enhance the haptic quality of the viewing experience.

Playing with and making visual patterns - some created from my photographs - was given a fresh impetus in Japan and Portugal by, for instance, kimonos, decorative papers, ceramic tiles, and architectural details. Especially inspiring were the kimonos depicting the four seasons created by Itchiku Kubota and on display at the Kubota Art Museum in Kawaguchi-ko, Japan. The kimonos are arranged one after another in a large circle that girdles the main room of the museum. Each kimono shows a slight change from the previous kimono as the seasons gradually shift and the viewer sees an entire year in the circle. The patterns in FLOATING BRIDGE were created from my photographs—highly manipulated in Photoshop - of the garden my wife Yukie cultivates at our home in Chicago.

The idea for writing the place and date in the following index comes from Yutaka Takanashi’s book Toshi-e (Towards the City), originally published in 1974 - a photographic poem and proto artist’s book.

The photographs in the books here were developed into sequentially arranged associative collages—the trace of origin remains.

SUMO GEISHA SASHIMI

cover - from a tv in Takaoka, Japan, November, 2011, offset CYK + pattern YK, metallic ink on Mohawk Superfine

all verso images—from a tv in Takaoka, November, 2011, inkjet on Asuka kozo

all recto images—Tsukiji fish market, Tokyo, December, 2011, inkjet on Asuka kozo

FLOATING BRIDGE OF DREAMS

front cover—Chou Bridge, Tsukishima, Tokyo, November, 2011, offset CMYK + black + pattern YK, metallic ink on Mohawk Superfine

inside front cover - pattern YK, offset metallic ink on Astrobrite black

page 1—on bus to Mt. Fuji, November, 2011, inkjet on Asuka

page 2—demon guarding Zuiryu-ji Temple, Takaoka, November 2011, inkjet on Asuka

page 3—Yukie and Kate running to the Itchiku Kubota Art Museum, offset CMYK + K + pattern YK, metallic ink on Mohawk Superfine

page 4—David (drawing in rock book), Newfoundland, September, 2012, offset quadtone + pattern YK, metallic ink on Mohawk Superfine

page 5 — Hikaru (making wish from Buddha), Takaoka, offset CMYK + pattern YK, metallic ink on Mohawk Superfine

page 6 — Newfoundland, September, 2012, offset CMYK + pattern YK, metallic ink on Mohawk Superfine

page 7 — Newfoundland, September, 2012, pattern YK, inkjet on Asuka

page 8 — pattern YK, inkjet on Asuka

page 9 — pattern YK, inkjet on Asuka

page 10 — Lisbon (tiles, jet), October, 2012, inkjet on Asuka

page 11 — Catarina & Isabel, Lisbon, October, 2012, offset CMYK + pattern YK, metallic ink on MSF

page 12 — Fuji lakes area + Chicago Halloween, Nov & Oct, 2011, offset CMYK + pattern YK, metallic ink

page 13 — Fuji lakes area, November, 2011, pattern YK, inkjet on Asuka

page 14 — Japanese tv + Chicago Halloween; pattern YK; inkjet on Asuka

page 15 — Japanese tv + Chicago Halloween, Nov & Oct, 2011, offset CMYK + pattern YK, metallic ink on MSF

page 16 — Blue line Chicago + Takaoka, Oct & Nov, 2011, offset CMYK + pattern YK , metallic ink on MSF

page 17 — Takaoka (Coca-Cola) + Chicago (claw), Nov & Oct, 2011, offset CMYK + pattern YK, metallic ink on MSF

page 18 — Newfoundland (dead frog), Sept 2012, offset CMYK + pattern YK, metallic ink on MSF

page 19 — Fuji lakes area (samurai), Nov, 2011 + pattern YK, inkjet on Asuka

page 20 — Nihonbashi (bridge in Tokyo with Mt. Fuji) , Point Reyes, California + pattern YK, inkjet on Asuka

page 21 — Nihonbashi (bridge in Tokyo), Point Reyes, California + pattern YK, inkjet on Asuka

page 22-23 — Yokohama, “The great earthquake of the 1st Sept., 1923 which swept its ways through the Kwanto district in a brief moment, played its wrathful havoc to the extremity in Yokohama city, laying waste nearly 90% of the whole city and burning to ashes the entire properties of the whole citizens, founded and accumulated in 60 over long years of toil and hardship. It did away with all the cultural establishments and organisations of the prospering city to complete destruction, leaving only a barren and desolate area with its crumbling remains. The photograph here from the hill of Minami-Ohtamachi shows the actual state of the city immediately after the catastrophe.” Library of Congress; inkjet on Asuka

page 24 — closeup of Yokohama panorama; inkjet on Asuka

page 25—British expedition to North Pole, Library of Congress, inkjet on Asuka

page 26-27 — Newfoundland sky, Sept, 2012 + pattern YK, inkjet on Asuka

page 28 — Newfoundland sky, Sept, 2012 + pattern YK, inkjet on Asuka

page 29 — Japanese woman and skeleton, Takaoka, under the Great Buddha statue, November, 2011, + pattern YK offset on metallic ink offset on Astrobrite black paper

page 30 — pattern YK, offset metallic ink on Astrobrite black paper

page 31 — pattern YK, offset metallic ink on Astrobrite black paper

page 32 — Newfoundland (David holding rock book + pattern), offset metallic ink on Astrobrite black

page 33 — overprint of page 17 with black + Newfoundland rock pattern, offset metallic ink on MSF

page 34 — overprint of page 18 with black + pattern YK, offset metallic ink on MSF

page 35 — pattern YK, inkjet on Asuka

page 36 — pattern YK, inkjet on Asuka

inside back cover - pattern YK, offset metallic ink on Astrobrite black

back cover - Point Reyes, California + pattern YK, offset metallic ink on MSF

pattern YK = pattern created from photographs by BF of Yukie Kobayashi’s garden, Chicago

MSF = Mohawk Superfine, offset paper

Astrobrite black = offset paper