Book-objects, actions  -  1990 bis 1992

Canada, 1990 The Trap, 1992 Orbis, 1992

As she began to occupy herself with psychological and nature-philosophical questions as well as with religions of the Far East, Pat Binder became increasingly conscious of the problematic conflict between nature and culture. In a country of sheer unending forests, [in Canada] she recognized in the tree an overall cultural symbol of the universe. She made first attempts to connect tree parts with the book, the epitome of culture. J.L. Borges was most likely the force behind this. According to him, the book is the most astonishing of all human tools because, while other aides are the extension of manual functions or the organs of the senses, it is an extension of the memory and the imagination. Among other things, he pointed out the fact that in the Orient today the idea still exists, that a book cannot reveal things but rather only help to discover them. Therefore it is an incentive to follow thoughts, to explain them and to interpret them based on one's own knowledge.

Mission, 1992

Resistance, 1992

Ecoglyphs, 1992 Detail, 1992

For her, books are symbols of civilization and holistic signs, in which the world is crystallized in miniature and from which countless views of the world arise. In this she found an ideal object for in her search for completeness and meaning. Despite all intellectual background, her way of dealing with it is more aesthetic. In this respect, it is for the most part not crucial which content the chosen books have. ... The opened book defines a space into which it reaches. Like a sculpture, the space has been expanded with branches and constructions made of other natural materials that project out of the pierced body of books. In other objects, the space remains limited to the dimension of the opened book. Assemblages of wood pieces, string, dried fruit peels, etc mounted onto these, their value increased by the background of the pages, appear as cryptic symbols. These »ecoglyphs« evoke an ideal, original condition of the unity between culture and nature, and remind one of their irretrievable harmony. Old German volumes in gothic typography were used exclusively for this. Pat Binder sees a parallel between this type's disappearance from daily use and the extinction of animal and plant varieties. She was also attracted by the intriguing correspondence between the branched form of the type and the organic forms place above it.

Action, 1992		The creation of these works came about as a kind of ritual act. The sacrilege of drilling and piercing books, the incunabula of civilization, the organization and assemblage of natural settings and, finally, the connection of both spheres are actions of symbolic consequence. In performances and actions, like »Piercing Books - Threading Culture« (1992, International Gaia Symposium in the Ruhr region), they were presented as independent, artistic forms of articulation.
		Abstracts from: Gerhard Haupt, Resistance-images In: Pat Binder: Zapping. Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen, Berlin 1996

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