Follow-ed (after Hokusai)

Sowden, Tom

Abstract

I can't stop making books in the style of Ed Ruscha. It has become an obsession, and my failure in trying to replicate an Ed Ruscha book, while always trying to succeed, is entirely part of the appeal to me. I don't live in 1960s California and my city is not an aspirational a place as Los Angeles was then, but I am not alone in this and many other artists share my passion and also produce books in an Ed Ruscha style. But why do we do this?
This paper first looks at my own practice and my journey as an Ed Ruscha rip-off act, and then looks at some of the books from my own collection of Ed Ruscha tribute books. Direct tributes such as the amazingly faithful reproduction of Royal Road Test; Macintosh Road Test by Corinne Carlson, Karen Henderson and Marla Hlady - true to the spirit even in the clothes they are wearing for the photographs - in which they subsituted a Macintosh Plus (Model 'X') computer for the origional Royal typewriter; to more conceptual books such as Doro Bohme's and Eric Baskauskas' Various Blank Pages, which presents all the blank pages from Nine Swimming Pools, Coloured People, A Few Palm Trees and Various Small Fires.
Although the books collected so far vary enourmously in size, subject matter and style, they all have an intrinsic 'Ed' theme, however tenuous the connection may be. The prevailing quality that I feel they all have is the element of humour reminiscent of Ruscha. Each artist has taken one of Ruscha's book and reinvented it with a knowing twist; referencing with wit, the time and environment that they find themselves in, just as Ruscha did in the 1960s and 1970s.

• Publication Date: Jan 1, 2013
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Pages: 449-459
• Book Title: Intersections and Counterpoints: Proceedings of Impact 7, an International Multi-Disciplinary Printmaking Conference
• ISBN: 9781921867569
• Keywords: Ed Ruscha, artists books
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/936399
• Publisher URL: http://www.publishing.monash.edu/books/ic-9781921867569.html