[To make you see]
By: Suzanne Sawyer
Contributors: Down Home Girl Studio; Al-Mutanabbi Street Coalition; Al-Mutanabbi Street Starts Here Artists' Books Collection (Columbia University. Rare Book and Manuscript Library)
Publisher: Down Home Girl Studio
Published: 2012
Place of publication: [Tuscaloosa, Alabama]
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; 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.
Notes: Title from statement on artist's website.

"To Make You See was created for The Al Mutanabbi Street Book Arts Coalition Project. It is an edition of 30. It contains quotes of Joseph Conrad, English novelist of Polish descent (b. 1857-d. 1921), and Lucius Annaeus Seneca, Roman philosopher (circa 4 BC-AD 65). Conrad remarked on the power of the written word to invoke awareness and Seneca remarked on the search for meaning as well as grieving, or allowing tears to fall, as a method for finding inner peace. The quotes overlay a map of Baghdad including the Al-Mutanabbi Street area and were chosen for their connection to the importance of books and reading as common ground for all people as well as to highlight Seneca's advice to allow ourselves to grieve as a method for achieving harmony as opposed to conjuring violence."--Artist's website.

"Designed, letterpress printed, and handbound by Suzanne Sawyer of Down Home Girl Studio in September 2012"--Colophon.

Edition of 30 copies numbered and signed by the artist.

Gift; Beau Beausoleil; 2019-2020.