Building a sculpture out of books is harder than it looks…

So, now we are getting into the structural planning process. Step 1: Measurements. Nicole, Alyssa, and myself (Sami), went out to the Gifford Terrace where our installation will be, tape measures in hand. We quickly came to realize that this space is much bigger when you’re standing inside of it than it looks as you’re passing by from the inside of Reilly Hall… Inside of our space stands a metal sculpture that is welded to a concrete pedestal. One of our goals is to stack books around the existing sculpture to create the look of a book shelf. After taking and reviewing our measurements, we are going to need 8-9 feet of books on all four sides to hide the structure… That’s A LOT of books! Here’s Alyssa measuring the existing sculpture… We may need more books than anticipated!

Step 2: How exactly do you build a book out of books? After measuring the space, we came up with a pretty good idea of what size we will be able to make the books. We began laying out books in the studio and trying different arrangements/techniques that will be able to best support our vision. Here’s some photos of our test run.

The next step will be figuring out how to get these books to stay together… Glue, liquid nails, screws? If you have experience with building giant books out of books or have input on what would work best to hold the sculpture together, leave some feedback! Til next time!

Hello book and art enthusiasts, alike!

We have created this blog to document our work throughout a collaborative sculpture independent study at Le Moyne College. The “we” includes 5 seniors from Le Moyne College, Alyssa, Kailee, Nicole, Maria, and Sami, and 1 all- inspiring professor, Zach. We are setting out to create, inspire, excite, and reinvent a space on our campus for our community to enjoy using books. Right now we are in the process of collecting books, THOUSANDS OF THEM, of any shape, size, and color, from any and every one we can. This photo is just a small portion of what we have collected from retiring professors on campus who are thrilled in their donations to our project. Ultimately, our goal is to create large scale books out of these much smaller books, but that is all I can give away until next time! For now, we will be sleeping, breathing, eating books and art…