Walking softly
Subtitle: memory and future
By: Mimi Shapiro
Contributors: Goya, Francisco, 1746-1828; Al-Mutanabbi Street Starts Here Artists' Books Collection (Columbia University. Rare Book and Manuscript Library); Al-Mutanabbi Street Coalition
Publisher: [publisher not identified]
Published: 2011
Place of publication: Lancaster, PA]
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; Cultural property; Destruction and pillage; Memory in art; Future in art; Fantasy in art; Despair in art; Hope in art; Artists' books
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.

"My book is an original poem story, about our world and what possibilities there are for all of us to live in a peaceful world. The wildflower fantasy drawings are painted and collaged over Arabic text, which I found in the booksellers market in Istanbul, Turkey. The torn aged paper signifies to me the fragile earth surface, between the collage and pencil scribbles, using copier reproductions of Goya's etchings for the darkness, below the earth's surface, the dark treachery of man's nightmare. Above are wildflowers with all the possibilities that life and beauty holds, the alternative between despair and hope. Inset in each small book are 3 collages, one of the books in the market, one of the bomb, and the last, the senseless fire of destruction. Two quotes that are meaningful to me, are included with my poem: ' ... that peace is not merely a distant goal that we seek, but a means by which we arrive at that goal' - Martin Luther King, Jr. The second quote is from Walking softly, an Arabic blessing that I saw on a beautiful plate, and copied down in my journal, hoping one day to use in a book"--The Book Arts at the Centre for Fine Print Research, UK website.
Notes: Printed in an edition of 3.

Medium/materials: Reproduced on a Canon Color Laser copier, and hand-assembled into an accordion book. Wrapped with fused caution tape; sewn over wire; mixed media.

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.

Most aptly described as a visual poet, Mimi Shapiro mixes trinkets and treasures, words and images, into a powerfully evocative body of work. Each piece conveys a sense of time and place as seen through the mind's eye of memory, combining reality and fantasy to create an amazingly cohesive vision. Her deeply 'connected' artistic expressions are accessible and immediate, while allowing interpretation to the imagination. Her works are included in many notable collections both in the United States and internationally.

In English and Arabic.