Hope lies in our hands
By: [by Lilla Duignan]
Contributors: Mutanabbī, Abū al-Ṭayyib Aḥmad ibn al-Ḥusayn, 915 or 916-965, poet; Al-Mutanabbi Street Coalition; Al-Mutanabbi Street Starts Here Artists' Books Collection (Columbia University. Rare Book and Manuscript Library)
Publisher: Holding Press
Published: 2011
Place of publication: [Brighton, England?]
Language: eng
Subjects: Violence; Pictorial works; Booksellers and bookselling; Bombings; Iraq War, 2003-2011; Protest movements; Books and reading in art; Intellectual life; Social conditions; Censorship; Terrorism in art; In art; War and civilization; Vehicle bombs; Visual literature; Specimens; Artists' books; Hope in art; Hand in art; Al-Mutanabbi Street Coalition
Description: "I created a happening in the garden shed, inviting close friends to a pop-up exhibition of recent bookworks, and giving each of them a brief description of our artists' books project for Iraq. Honoured to be included, friends' hands were photographed holding a book: images taken in black and white exemplify the gravity of the past, as well as the beauty of these hands in the present, and the hope we hold. Each person received a handmade bookmark to acknowledge their contribution and the resultant work, hope lies in our hands includes a bookmark, too"--The Book Arts at the Centre for Fine Print Research, UK website (viewed June 22, 2015).

Lilla's final piece of work for her MA in printmaking and artists' books was a 60-page website, a demanding and fulfilling challenge that facilitated her creative practice returning to a heart-centred focus.
Notes: Printed in an edition of 4.

"Series 1."

Medium: Digitally printed.

"In honour of all victims of the bombing of al-Mutanabbi Street, the centre of bookselling in Baghdad, on March 5th, 2007."

"With thanks to all friends who lent a hand"--Colophon.

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.

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.

Gift; Beau Beausoleil; 2019-2020.