James Castle: Memory Palace

James Castle was a deaf artist who created detailed drawings of domestic interiors, farm scenes, fantastical figures, animals, and architectural constructions using soot, saliva, and cardboard. Despite his inability to read, write, or speak, his remarkable memory enabled him to produce a vast collection of intelligent artworks. This book explores his work through the lens of a "Memory Palace" and reproduces many previously unknown works, referencing other documents from the James Castle Collection and Archive.

Format: Hardback
Length: 280 pages
Publication date: 02 February 2021
Publisher: Yale University Press

Self-taught artist James Castle (1899–1977) is renowned for his captivating soot and saliva drawings, which capture the intricate details of domestic interiors and farm scenes, as well as fantastical figures, animals, and architectural constructions crafted from cardboard and stitched paper. Born into a family of homesteaders in Idaho, Castle's visual world encompassed a range of seemingly ordinary subjects, including rural landscapes, houses, barns, and outbuildings; interiors adorned with closed and open doors, beds, bureaus, tile floors, and intricately patterned wallpaper; and color copies of illustrated advertisements for food, fuel, and matches.

Despite being deaf from birth, Castle never learned to read, write, or speak. However, this remarkable disability led to the development of an extraordinary memory, which enabled him to create a vast collection of highly intelligent artworks. Author John Beardsley delves into the life and work of Castle in this captivating book, exploring how his limitations shaped his artistic process. Beardsley approaches Castle's work as if navigating through a series of rooms, known as a "Memory Palace," where interiors, exteriors, objects, books, and words are reproduced and interconnected. Through this lens, Beardsley uncovers many previously unknown works and provides fresh insights into Castle's creative process, referencing other documents made available for the first time from the James Castle Collection and Archive.

Published in association with the James Castle Collection and Archive, this book offers a fascinating new perspective on the life and art of James Castle, a visionary artist whose deafness propelled him to achieve remarkable feats of visual awareness and memory.

Weight: 1596g
Dimension: 291 x 247 x 37 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780300253498