You ask me what I'm scared of
By: Mike Dutton
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: One.zero6 Press
Published: 2012
Place of publication: [Bristol, 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; Secret societies; Haiku; Al-Mutanabbi Street Coalition; Ikhwān al-Ṣafāʼ
Description: "A set of 5 A6 letterpress (sans serif typeface) cards, comprising 1 original haiku & 4 'found text' cards within a slip cover containing a quote from the 'Brethren of Purity' (a 10th century CE secret society of philosophers based in Iraq. The structure of this mysterious organization, and the identities of its members, has never been revealed). The cards are contained within an envelope showing a 'Map of Terrestrial Paradise' from the 16th Century CE. The cards relate to the history of Baghdad and the street of booksellers"--The Book Arts at the Centre for Fine Print Research, UK website (viewed June 23, 2015).
Notes: Printed in an edition of 5.

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.

"Turn from the sleep of negligence and the slumber of ignorance, for the world is a house of delusion"--Quote from the Brethren of Purity.

Gift; Beau Beausoleil; 2019-2020.