"Mute"
Subtitle: a Promethean alphabet
By: Russell Maret.
Contributors: Artists' Books Collection (Library of Congress)
Publisher: Russell Maret
Published: 2001
Place of publication: [Rosendale, N.Y.]
Language: eng
Number of pages: 24
Subjects: Alphabets -- Specimens.; Greek language -- Alphabet -- Specimens.; Alphabet books.; Alphabet in art.; Lettering in art.; Prometheus (Greek deity); Gods, Greek, in art.; Artists' books -- New York (State)
Genres: Specimens.
Notes: From an extended series of works inspired by Henry David Thoreau's translation of Prometheus Bound, each work inspired by a specific line or idea from the translation. "Mute" is inspired by the lines, "[I, Prometheus] taught them the risings  Of the stars, and goings down, hard to determine. And numbers, chief of inventions, I found out for them, and the assemblages of letters ..."--R. Maret, 10/22/2003.
"I found it poignant that the letters that Prometheus, stripped of his powers, most likely 'found out' for us were no longer legible, except to a few scholars. My method was to reduce the old Athenian alphabet to its most elemental and abstract forms as a metaphor of his condition."--R. Maret, 10/22/2003.
"'Mute' is also part of a much longer investigation into geometric lettering. [It] was intended to explore the effect of slight asymmetries on the perception of 'humanity' in a letter form that has no fluctuation in line thickness"--R. Maret, 10/22/2003.
Title, author, date, and edition statement handwritten in ink at bottom of first illustrated leaf (leaf [2]).
Letters drawn in pencil, India ink and gouache, in solid  black, geometric forms, one to a leaf.
Four gatherings of three folded sheets each, laid loose in a black linen box. A small square illustration, another letter of the alphabet, or part of one, inlaid on front of box.