Requiem
By: Lorie Lee Andrews
Contributors: Mutanabbī, Abū al-Ṭayyib Aḥmad ibn al-Ḥusayn, 915 or 916-965; Brissler, F. (Friedrich), 1818-1893; Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus, 1756-1791; Al-Mutanabbi Street Coalition; Al-Mutanabbi Street Starts Here Artists' Books Collection (Columbia University. Rare Book and Manuscript Library)
Publisher: [publisher not identified]
Published: 2013
Place of publication: Carmel, Ind.]
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; Altered books; Al-Mutanabbi Street Coalition
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.

"Lorie Lee is an artist and illustrator who has never been shy to try a new medium. Printmaker, book artist and painter, she creates mixed media pieces that often include her prints as their foundation. Her work has been called whimsical and playful, often times using meticulous detail and symbolic imagery. She finds inspiration in everyday experiences, her love of nature and spiritual expression"--The Harrison Center for the Arts website.
Notes: Consists of an altered book, woodcut prints, acrylic.

An altered book from Friedrich Brissler's rendering of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Requiem (Leipzig : Peters, [ca. 1900]).

"This piece was made by altering copies of the score for Mozart's Requiem, a piece traditionally played for funerals and memorials. When the book is opened, a woodcut print of buildings from Al-Mutanabbi Street pop up out of the score. Thirty-three tiny books that actually open with words in various different languages are scattered throughout the image. They represent the thirty-three people who were killed at the March 5, 2007 bombing of Baghdad's Street of the Booksellers. This piece was first shown at the Center for Book Arts in New York City, and is still part of a traveling exhibit that has been shown nationally and internationally"--The artist's personal website.

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.