Mesmer: Secrets of the Human Frame

Toni Dove

Published by Granary Books, 1993

About this Item

Limited first edition of Dove's artist's book, based on her electronic media installation which investigated the human form within an historical and psychoanalytical context. Drawing inspiration from the work of hypnotist Anton Mesmer and texts by figures like Sigmund Freud and French symbolist Villiers de L'Isle Adam, Dove examines the convergence of the spiritual and the technical in the 19th century, a period marked by advancements in science, psychology, and technology. Using imagery reminiscent of X-rays, cinema, and gothic novels, Dove crafts figures that blend the human, mechanical, and mystical. Limited to 60 copies, of which 10 are hors commerce and 50 are for sale, this being number 14. Signed by Dove to the colophon. "There was a story to tell, and the story was about the century we're about to exit. It starts with Thomas Edison, the birth of cinema, the phonograph. With Freud and psychoanalysis. With the gothic novel and the Industrial Revolution. And the story is about how we changed as the century changed. This story is about building an Android." Toni Dove s Mesmer, after having undergone several metamorphoses (computer-driven slide and sound installation, radiophonic work, essay), has most recently been recreated as an artist s book. This work, which refers to itself as a fractured icon, an unstable portrait, is both a study of the construction of female identity and an elegy to the intersecting 19th century origins of psychoanalysis, cinema, and industrial technologies . Through a dialogical collage-montage in the voices of Freud, Dora, Echo, and a Cyborg Angel . Mesmer is a mediatic robotic machine that investigates how the soul is nothing but corporeal facade and speech act (Weiss, Art + Text). New York: Granary Books, 1993. Printed offset photolithography in shades of metallic ink by Lori Spencer at the Borowsky Center for Publication Arts in Philadelphia, using both transparent and opaque papers, including a three-dimensional centerfold pop-up. Bound between perforated metal boards with a hinged spine revealing a screen mesh and iridiscent plastic fly leaf below, issued in a silver painted slipcase covered with silver leaf. Bound in metal by Daniel E. Kelm and staff at the Wide Awake Garage, with slipcases made by Jill Jevne; pp. 9 10; 25 26; 41 42. In fine condition. Seller Inventory # ABE-1734035856886

Bibliographic Details

Title: Mesmer: Secrets of the Human Frame

Publisher: Granary Books

Publication Date: 1993

Binding: Hardcover

Condition: Fine

Signed: Signed by Author(s)

Edition: 1st Edition