Yeah, that’s a book.
Ok it’s more than one book, but nevertheless this sculpture by Brian Dettmer is one of his many creations slightly reminiscent of the familiar concept of scrapbooking taken to an extreme.  Unlike scrapbooking where you cut pictures out, he cuts into the books (often old encyclopedias, medical guides, textbooks and of that sort) exposing the books’ skeletons using scalpels, tweezers, and other medical instruments to carve into the surface of  books, resulting in new relationships as they transform into different creatures than the original intention.

via Brian Dettmer's Flickr

Speaking of skeletons, Dettmer also employs other mediums such as old cassettes (like your first MC Hammer tape) and using a variety of methods, to form them into bizarre and sometimes haunting sculptures.

via Mito

Brian Dettmer is an American artist originally from Illinois and attended Columbia College Chicago where he earned his BA in fine arts in 1997.  His early art work included paintings based on braille, Morse Code and other forms of coded language.  He moved on to pasting newspaper and book pages to canvas, tearing pieces to reveal layers and finally began experimenting by cutting into books.  His work has been published and exhibited widely around the world including New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Barcelona and Toronto.  His homepage displays all of his media innovations, check it.

via Brian Dettmer Flickr

While some of the public have criticized him for “destroying” books, the ones that he uses are not first editions and are like those found gathering dust in any library or bookstore’s lost relevance section.  It’s not destruction, it’s rebirth: breathing new life into an ordinary object and redefining it’s form, function and meaning.

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