The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines chaos as 1) complete confusion and disorder: a state in which behavior and events are not controlled by anything; or 2) the state of the universe before there was any order and before stars and planets were formed.
Creation theories aside, life isn't always characterized as chaos... but in this week's book-of-the-week, Indigo Chaos, it is.
Indigo Chaos gets it's title from the background imagery created by drawing with a string and india ink on a polyester plate; then using lithography to print the image in shades of blue on sheets of text paper. The random marks bring to mind a jumble of disorderliness, as if one were tumbling in an abyss of the unknown. Instead of using a codex-style book form, the pages have been assembled into an accordion book. Which, with it's zig-zag structure, reiterates the concept of non-conformity. The page connections are facilitated with black Yuzen (printed Japanese) paper, chosen to remind one of an iron gate...life being the ultimate gate. And the gate also symbolizes transition... which is often associated with a feeling of chaos... or lack of control. Red silk thread runs through the entire book... again, signifying life. Geometry personified, it juts up and down, makes crosses and loops, and seems to speak it's own language.
Finally, there is the poem...written by this artist (while digging a garden bed for summer squash... note the reference to rocks and weeds...and the wilderness!) and then letterpress printed on Pearl (the 100-year old press here at Orange Lantern Press) as a variable edition of three. This is the poem...
INDIGO CHAOS
Sometimes life
feels like an Indigo Chaos
and you just have
to find your way
out
through the blood gates
of memory
You will find
your way
Following that thin
red line...
one day
to the next
and even when
you’re through (the gat)e...
you’re not through,
really.
Find a good spot,
squat in the dirt
and pick out the
rocks.
Don’t think you can
pull out all the weeds
They’ll just grow back
stronger
...and you will too.
When life swallows you
whole
and you’re in the wilderness.
-kcs
The last page.. the Colophon... a short list of the attributes or bio of the little book. And see.. the red thread has gone WILD!
