A gardener at midnight
Subtitle: travels in the Holy Land : from drawings made on the spot by Yabez Al-Kitab
By: Peter Lyssiotis
Contributors: Castro, Brian; Oppen, Monica, binder; Al-Mutanabbi Street Coalition; Al-Mutanabbi Street Starts Here Artists' Books Collection (Columbia University. Rare Book and Manuscript Library)
Publisher: [publisher not identified]
Published: 2011
Place of publication: [Australia]
Language: eng
Number of pages: 27
Subjects: Iraq War, 2003-2011; In art; War and civilization
Description: This collection supports and promotes awareness to the important mission and framework of the Al-Mutanabbi Street Starts Here Coalition's focus on the lasting power of the written word and the arts in support of the free expression of ideas, the preservation of shared cultural spaces, and the importance of responding to attacks, both overt and subtle, on artists, writers, and academics working under oppressive regimes or in zones of conflict, despite the destruction of that literary/cultural content.
Notes: Title from title page.

Author's name from page following title page.

Date from colophon. Title page is dated MMIV [2004]. Footer on each page reads: Gardener at midnight SI_revised.indd 9/06/11 10:41 am."

"This book was made in 2011 because Beau Beausoleil asked for a response in book form, to the bombing of AL-Mutanabbi Street, Baghdad. The prepress work was completed by Splitting Image Pty Ltd, Australia; the book is printed on Mowhawk Superfine paper and features a Bembo typeface. A gardener at midnight has been bound by Monica Oppen and is an edition of 3, with 2 artist's proofs. You are now holding number ..."--Colophon (page 27).

Rare Book (Al-Mutanabbi) copy: No. 3, signed by the author.

On March 5th, 2007, a car bomb exploded on al-Mutanabbi Street in Baghdad. Al-Mutanabbi Street is located in a mixed Shia-Sunni area. More than 30 people were killed and more than 100 wounded. Al-Mutanabbi Street, the historic center of Baghdad bookselling, holds bookstores and outdoor bookstalls, cafes, stationery shops, and even tea and tobacco shops. It has been the longstanding heart and soul of the Baghdad literary and intellectual community for centuries. In response to the attack, a San Francisco poet and bookseller, Beau Beausoleil, rallied a community of international artists and writers to produce a collection of letterpress-printed broadsides (poster-like works on paper), artists' books (unique works of art in book form), and an anthology of writing, all focused on expressing solidarity with Iraqi booksellers, writers and readers. The coalition of contributing artists calls itself Al-Mutanabbi Street Starts Here Coalition.

Gift; Beau Beausoleil; 2019-2020.