Bill Kelly and James Renner have collaborated on numerous projects since they started working together in 1979—this is their first limited-edition artists’ book. In this, Kelly prompted the artist with the phrase “birds and men.” Then the poem by Kelly was written in response to Renner’s graphite drawings which were transformed into multicolor woodcut images. According to both of them, it is a parable of folly, wherein feckless humans mark their presence while their counterparts in nature warily look on.
Poem by Bill Kelly; multicolor woodcuts by James Renner on nineteenth-century F. J. Head handmade paper. Text hand set in Gill Sans and printed letterpress by Nelle Martin. Woodcuts printed by the artist. French folded folios bound in paste paper and housed in a clamshell box covered in Cave paper. 7 5/16" x 8 3/8". Edition of 35. 2006. $1,700.