Prose and Letters ~ California
(Cari Ferraro)

Star Spell
By Cari Ferraro
San Jose, California: Prose and Letters, 2007. Edition of 53.

4.625 x 3.625"; 16 pages. French fold accordion book, printed and bound by artist. Pages digitally printed on both sides of Zerkall book paper with archival pigment inks. Background reproduced from a watercolor painting, on which the words STAR SPELL were lettered large in resist, and the paper then painted in layers of watercolor to reveal the words in the twilight sky background. Stars handpainted in iridescent ink on front cover and two interior pages. Text lettering reproduced from original calligraphy. Flyleaves of sheer Japanese unryu "cloud dragon paper" with silver and gold flecks. Book sewn into hand painted paper cover which wraps around, the front flap decorated with a star shape in the form of a fire invoking pentacle.

Cari Ferraro: "This well known verse fulfills the definition of a spell: a simple rhyme, a wish, invoking one of the four elements. The last page offers a haiku-like verse on the art of making magic, a reference to the old ways hidden in the nursery rhyme."

Star light

Star bright…

$88

The First Writing
By Cari Ferraro
San Jose, California: Prose and Letters, 2004. Edition of 50.

5.25 x 6.75" closed, 49" open; 8 pages. Handmade accordion book in Lokta paper-covered case with bead and leather closure, gold painted accents. Reproduced from an original hand lettered and painted book.

Cari Ferraro: "I was inspired to create this book by the work of archeologist Marija Gimbutas, whose theory was that the first writing actually predated Sumerian businessmen by a few thousand years, and instead grew out of symbolic marks on ritual objects made to venerate the Great Mother in Old Europe. The idea that writing came out of a spiritual place rather than a commercial one appeals to me as a calligrapher. I invented an alphabet style based on Marija's catalog of marks, and in the background of the paste paper used symbols found in the 5000-year-old passage grave Newgrange in Ireland, whose meaning has never been fully understood.

“ Though I wanted the book to open out to give a feeling of a cave wall, I also wanted to close, preferably by wrapping, so I made a case for it so that it opens like a regular codex, but with an accordion structure that can open out completely to see all the pages at once."
$150

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