Tom Phillip's book

Examples of Tom Phillip's Work: The Humument.

I have spent a great deal of time viewing the Humument online. I absolutely love this book! I think I will need to buy one for my collection. I am so inspired by it and think i will create one myself. But of course in my own style using my wildly varied and brutally amateur artistic skills :)

From reading 12, A.R. Penck altered a maths book with his own graphics, Tom Phillips defaced an old Victorian novel with his art and constructed text from text already provided, Helen Brunner mutilated and assembled juxtaposed text fragments of documents, Harry Reece implanted references from Dadaists and Surrealists text and figures onto his own work, Buzz Spector short sheeted books but kept their original titles.

"For most book artists, the basic way of altering books consists of reproducing the original volumes without changes and then using it as a sketch book with a few doodles and isolated words, all of which drastically reduces the legibility of the original printed text. " Altering Books - The Cutting Edge of Reading.

Tom Phillip's work was considered significant in the genre because it was ground breaking. It is said that he was possibly the first artist to reconstruct an already existing, published book this way: inventing the format.
Phillip's took a Victorian novel "The Human Document" and created from it "The Humument". Phillip's says that he "treated" the existing book, and in this treatment he painted, collages, cut out, drew and scribbled, and highlighted text of differing sections on each page.
The traditions form and structure of the prior book.... have been completely demolished to create new form and new structure. But there is the essence of the old structure that comes through in the colour washed over words that have been allowed to remain or lie dormant in the background.
Some of the critical responses to the book have been along the lines of, "destruction of an original work", that Phillip's is merely an editor.... but I think there is real genius to his work. The relationship between image and text varies so much from page to page.... In the chaos of not conforming to structure... there is a structure. The poetry has been highlighted by almost a comic styled panelling or speech bubbles. The text, ever present either in the old Victorians novel, or in the selected text/poetry of Phillips - It curls around, quietly states and rudely obstructs and at times dominates the page.... but what it does is interest with the imagery on the page. On each page, as each page is so different. It's engaging and inspiring and clever
The relationship between the author and the artist...... I would assume there is no relationship personally between them. Phillips has chosen a book to desecrate and create a new from it. The author has completed his work... and the illustrator or designer has completed the work. Funnily enough, not unlike the illuminants working on commission :)