Booking: Artists’ Books by Black Artists

This exhibition brings together a collection of artists’ books that explore Black histories, identities, and futures through the language of the book as an art form. Featuring works by artists across disciplines, from printmaking and photography to sculpture and graphic design, the exhibition highlights how books can serve as powerful spaces for storytelling, cultural memory, experimentation, and resistance. Through handcrafted volumes, zines, scrolls, and sculptural book objects, Booking celebrates the creativity, resilience, and expansive vision of Black artists who are redefining what a book can be.

Many of the books are specifically about experiencing Blackness. They range from personal stories to historical information illuminated through creative interpretations. Insights within the books’ pages encourage viewers to ponder unfamiliar points of view. “Universality” is a quality seldom applied to Black stories in mainstream Western spaces. These books invite close looking and reading. Revealing a wide range of creative expression about a range of topics through words and images, the works in this exhibition inform and captivate viewers, extending imagined boundaries for contemporary book art.