Molly's Tapestry

Mollys Tapestry is an encrypted transcription of the final 'Penelope chapter of Ulysses, exploring the relationship between visual art and literature. It celebrates the Centenary of James Joyce's poem in Panowa and the Bicentenary of Jean-Louis Champollion's decipherment of Egyptian hieroglyphs in 1822. It poses the political question of how to read and write punctuation with respect to the structure and earliest origins of writing.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 180 pages
Publication date: 28 October 2021
Publisher: Troubador Publishing

In 1922, a pivotal year in literary history, Jan Miller, a young avant-garde writer, unveiled a groundbreaking proposal. He envisioned an "Abstract Art of the 21st Century," solely reliant on the marks of punctuation. This artistic endeavor marked the latest installment in a series of artists' books that delved into the intricate interplay between mark, word, and image. Mollys Tapestry, an encrypted transcription of the final "Penelope chapter" from James Joyce's iconic masterpiece, Ulysses, takes this exploration further. It delves into the new artistic possibilities opened up by the young Polish Futurist, who elevated punctuation marks to the status of aesthetic objects. Positioned at the crossroads of visual art and literature, Mollys Tapestry celebrates the Centenary of Joyce's poem "Panowa" and the seminal work of Joyce himself. Moreover, it commemorates the Bicentenary of Jean-Louis Champollion's groundbreaking achievement in deciphering Egyptian hieroglyphs in 1822, a breakthrough that was later elaborated upon in Précis du système hiéroglyphique des ancients Égyptiens. Mollys Tapestry thus suggests a profound analogy between the relationship between theory and practice in art and science. Through its graphic abstraction, it raises the urgent political question of how to read and write punctuation, considering the very structure and origins of writing itself.

Dimension: 234 x 156 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781803130767