Dancing over dark waters : the chapbook

A$400 · Offered by Douglas Stewart Fine Books

Sydney : the artists, 2012. Quarto, hand-printed linocut wrappers, pp [32], illustrated with original linocuts. Edition limited to 30 signed copies, each varying somewhat in colour. A smaller format edition of the artist s book Dancing over Dark Waters , limited to 7 copies, in larger format. The textual content in both editions is the same. A chapbook based on the artists book, Dancing over dark waters . The text is reset, and different images unique to this book appear, except for the cover, which reproduces part of an etching from the main work. The other images comprise linocut relief prints, and an interleaved etching on acid free tissue, which varies in different copies of the edition. The work reveals the three artists response to one of Sydney s darkest historical colonial sites, Cockatoo Island, an imperial prison, industrial school, reformatory and jail. The text also evokes the present day situation of refugees and refers to those other islands we use as a noose Nauru, Christmas Island, Timor, Malaysia, asking: When will the time come when compassion will span the dark waters like an indestructible bridge uniting us and the best part of our dreams for the future with the best part of their dreams for the future. NLA website.

• Binding: Hardcover

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