BookBUS
P4 (pilot) at Performance Space, Sydney
12-14 November 2010
Collaborating with The Footpath Library
BookBUS is a live reading activity that will visit three inner-city Sydney sites from Friday 12–Sunday 14 November 2010. Collaborating with The Footpath Library, a collection of donated books will be transported in a mobile book van and staffed with volunteers who will read aloud to visitors from a book of their choosing. Participants will be encouraged to share their thoughts about the experience following the reading and to keep the book if they like. Lucas Ihlein will coordinate the BookBUS as travels around Sydney.
Collect the BookBUS Guide to Reading Aloud (1.7 MB) from the van at the three venues or download it here
BookBUS Free Reading Schedule
Friday 12 Nov, 1-5pm
Wesley Mission's Edward Eagar Lodge, Homeless Services, Surry Hills
Saturday 13 Nov, 11am-6pm
Eveleigh Markets and Carriageworks, Eveleigh
Sunday 14 Nov, 1-5pm
Surry Hills Library and Community Centre, Surry Hills
BookBUS is about the way we invest and imagine ourselves within a book. It highlights how the books we read create a sense of who we are, both through our original encounter with the story and whenever we recollect ourselves and the book anew. Reading aloud is associated for many with a longing for remnants of early childhood and the parental intimacy of the bedtime story. While such humans emotions are universal the imaginary dimension of the book is facing dramatic change, some saying that the book itself is under threat. This is mainly because of a series of social and technological revolutions, including the 19th century invention of reading as a private activity, the anonymity of library books and the rise of mass media and digital communications that are bypassing the object of the book altogether. By fostering the shared art of storytelling BookBUS seeks to revive the experience of the book as an object that helps us to create, carry and share our dreams, ambitions and memories.
See the Performance Space website for more information on reading times and locations, and how to contribute to or participate in BookBUS.
Thank you to all the volunteers and particularly to Sarah Garnett, founding manager of The Footpath Library.
Lucas Ihlein is an artist who works with printing, publishing and blogging.
He is part of the artists' printing collective Big Fag Press:
http://bigfagpress.org and is currently engaged in an environmental audit at the Museum of Contemporary Art: http://environmental-audit.net, as well as a gardening experiment at Sydney College of the Arts: http://tending.net.au
This work was commissioned by Performance Space and Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts in 2010 as a part of P4, a live art initiative supported by the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body and by the British Council
Being of the Book
Moores Building, presented by Fremantle Arts Centre
6-7 August 2010
Following its first incarnation in October 2009 as No place like, Being of the book has been presented in Fremantle as a one-on-one performance, held in the oldest building in Fremantle, the former storehouse of the Moores merchant family building. Visitors to the event were invited to choose a book from a small library to be read aloud by Lily. Over 30 books were contributed from people's private collections on the theme of belonging to a place. These included stories of joy, homecoming, exile and adventure, ranging from The Golden Gate by Vikram Seth and Robert Dessaix's Arabesques, to Herman Melville's Moby Dick and The Quangle Wangle's Hat by Edward Lear. Being of the book will be performed on an ongoing basis at various sites.
No place like...
Avoca Project, Central Victoria
10 October 2009
No place like is a one-on-one performance, held in the dining room of the Swiss House at the Eco Living Festival on Saturday 10 October. Visitors to the house were invited to choose a book from a small library and to sit down join Lily as she reads a specific passage aloud. For its first instalment, over 30 people donated books to the collection, in response to the premise that it encapsulates the experience of belonging to a place. Stories of intimacy, adventure and passion accompanied this remarkable array of books, which ranged from Voss by Patrick White to Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert Pirsig. No place like will be performed on an ongoing basis.
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