In The Blue Notebook

Many thanks to artist Jim Butler for including an interview with me about my book How To Say 'I Love You' In Greenlandic in his thoughtful article in the latest issue of The Blue Notebook (Vol. 7 No. 2). Butler examines how the development of the concept of an original limited edition print in the late 19th century established an artistic and economic framework for artist printmakers which is still largely valid today. Butler's article also includes an interview with veteran book artist and founder of Circle Press, Ron King.

Oxford University Residency

Lady Margaret Hall, The Library

I have been offered the Lady Margaret Hall Visual and Performing Arts Residency for the academic year 2013–2014. During this time I will be based at the Oxford college and will contribute to its cultural life. Details of the residency programme will be announced soon.

Words Across Northumberland

I have been appointed as a Words Across Northumberland Writer in Residence.

Stories from the Flood places a creative writer in two Northumbrian libraries, Morpeth and Rothbury. Both towns were affected by catastrophic flooding in 2008. Susan Fletcher (in Morpeth) and I (in Rothbury) will spend time meeting staff and visitors and creating a body of work on the themes of flooding and climate change. Having researched and written on these issues during recent residencies in Denmark and Greenland, I look forward to bringing a global perspective on climate change to the region of the UK where I grew up.

I will make an initial mobile library tour of the area on Wednesday 19 June, and will be meeting the public in Rothbury Library on 20 and 21 June.

Some Small Good Things: World Book Night 2013

On Tuesday 23rd April the annual world book night collaboration began. Since 2010 I have been celebrating world book night with Sarah Bodman and fellow book artists, including Angie Butler and Natalie McGrorty. The events have seen new books generated from novels by Patricia Highsmith, Douglas Coupland and Donna Tartt. This year, the chosen text by Raymond Carver was more minimal in two senses - firstly, it was short story rather than a novel, and secondly, as the title itself suggests, it concerns A Small Good Thing.

This year, hot on the heels of organising Bristol Artists' Book Event, Sarah Bodman co-ordinated the event and dinner, with a collaborative text that contained contributions of small, good things from book artists around the world. A film was produced (in homage to Robert Altman's Short Cuts - itself inspired by Carver's stories). The film and full details of the project can be viewed on the UWE bookarts website, where there is also a free, downloadable version of the texts. These can be printed at home to create a zine, and there's even a blank page provided to fill in with a small, good thing of your own to make the book unique. 

Sea Voyages in Contemporary Art

John Cumming Ditty Box (2011)

My review of the exhibition Voyage: sea journeys, island hopping and trans-oceanic concepts, curated by Imi Maufe and Rona Rangsch at Künstlerhaus Dortmund, Germany can now be read online in the Huffington Post.