Customer Reviews

The Exquisite Book: 100 Artists Play a Collaborative Game

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I tried to read this book from cover to cover, visually, and it was just not enough. I now display one fold out page per week or as long as is necessary to really see at what I am looking. This book fits the criteria for the kind of art I hang on my walls: it must be endlessly visually compelling and it must grab my heart. Add to that the intellectual curiosity of each artist's piece and this book becomes a mini-museum of delight. Congratulations on the concept and thank you.

This book is so creative and smart. The illustrations are beautiful and will pull you in to discover what the connections are from one to the other. When I looked at it with a friend, I discovered that we each saw different connecting entry points and that made it ever more captivating. Dave Eggers introduction is so true, that however complicated, all our stories are in some way connected. This was a huge undertaking...a hundred contemporary artists participating by responding to a previous artist is done to perfection. The fold=out design was a perfect format. You will look at this over and over and then match the interview as to why the artists responded the way they did. Art teachers will especially want to try this with students and use the book as an example. The variety of ideas and the playfulness are refreshing and gorgeous.

This book is not just thought provoking, it's also really fun! It is obvious most of the artists put a lot of time and creativity into their page, and I like the "chapter" themes the editors came up with. Over time I'm sure I will be looking up my favorites to see what kind of other work the various artists have done. The production quality is very good, especially for such a reasonable price, with good binding, folding and clear print quality throughout.

Granted, this book is not perfect, in that the editors definitely should have sent a few pictures back with a "read the rules and try again" note because some artists acted as if they just couldn't be bothered with actually lining up their painting with the page before. Seriously, that's the point of the whole book! Luckily, on balance most DID try to work with the previous images, and in many cases the connections made between multiple images is truly fantastic. Also luckily, even the paintings that are "on their own" are usually good works too. Still, it can be annoying to see a great series of pictures kind of come to a dead end when the next artist maybe uses one tiny line to "connect" and ignores all the interesting possibilities the previous image had!

I'd love to see this project done again in the future with other artists and designers; you really could never run out of things you could do with this concept!

The Book is amazing! Great concept, perfect execution, nice format. A must for designers, artists and people who love the game approach to important things in life.
The Exquisite Book: 100 Artists Play a Collaborative Game

I bought this book for my friend for Christmas and just received it in the mail today. It is an absolutely beautiful book to look through and I don't know what I was thinking not buying one for myself! As a current art student, I am extremely inspired by all of the creative works this book has to offer. It has a multitude of different designs and patterns as you flow from page to page. I have been reading the blog "Book By It's Cover" for some time now and it has been such a joy to watch the story unfold and see how all of the different artists worked together to formulate such a unified piece of artwork. If you want a wonderful, unique work of art in the form of a book, you must purchase this! It is both beautiful and entertaining. I cannot wait to get a copy for myself soon!

A fun artistic collaboration. Love books with pages that fold out - gives me a sense of tactile play as well as a delightful feast for my eyes.

I am so in love with this book... I can't believe how beautiful it is. I'm really interested in illustrations lately (as I've started to do it myself a bit) and I am so amazed by all the artwork in this book. I just stare and stare at it... there's just so much richness of art... I love this.

I bought this book here after reading about it on the book-by-its-cover blog, which I really enjoy. I loved the concept, and I still think it's a great idea. But if I'd taken the time to find it in a bookstore and looked at it "in person" first, I wouldn't have purchased it.

There are a few good visual connections from one page to the next (half of which are shown as the examples on the blog), but much more of it is a disjointed grouping of random illustrations, strung together, but hanging by a thread. Which doesn't make it a terrible book, but it doesn't live up to the expectation created. There's a section in the book where the artists answer different questions about their submissions. Many of them should've been asked why they agreed to be part of a collaboration if they had no intention of cooperating with its one basic premise.

If you're someone like me who does enjoy disjointed groupings of random illustrations, I recommend skipping this one and putting your money toward a Society of Illustrators, Communication Arts, or one of the other juried annuals that present a better selection of contemporary illustration. A few of these might turn up there.

I could just sit for hours and look at this book. I love all of the creativity that went in to all of the designs.
Simply fabulous.

This book showcases the talents of some wonderful artists - not the least of whom are those who put the whole project together. I love collaborations, and this book is a great one. Thanks! And I wish I had been at some of those Art History lectures so I could have taken part in the exercise... buy this book and you will wish you were there too.