Sibyl Rubottom ~ California

Animals of Chiapas
By Sibyl Rubottom
San Diego, California: Bay Park Press, 2008. Edition of 50.

4.75 x 5"; 16 unnumbered pages. Accordion structure. Digitally printed. Bound in orange paper-covered boards with illustrated paper title label on front. Signed by the artist.

Sibyl Rubottom, colophon: "This limited edition of the Animals of Chiapas was printed from the original artist's book of drawings done in gouache, watercolor, and crayon of the woolen animals made by the women of San Cristobal in Chiapas, Mexico. These portraits are an attempt to share the warmth and humor that these animals generate."
&75

The Sibyls
By Sibyl Rubottom
San Diego, California: Bay Park Press, 2006. Edition of 10.

12 x 10"; 26 pages. Fold-out pages. Printed on Dutch etching paper in Bodoni, Bernard Modern, Albertus, and Palatino type. Eight intaglio prints plus six color reproductions of five sibyls in the Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel and Archne (A Sibyl) by Velasquez. Bound in cloth-covered boards with a title/author plate inset in the top board. Laid in drop-spine clamshell paper-covered box.

This book about sibyls (by a Sibyl) tells of 5 ancient sibyls – the Cumaean, the Delphic, the Erythraean, the Persian, and the Libyan. Short descriptions are accompanied by a intaglio leaf print (because sibyls often wrote their prophecies on leaves) and a color reproduction of the named Sibyl as depicted in Western art.

Introduction: "The dream comes again each night. How to move the plates? Unearth the prophecies of the leaves, layers of moss, earth covering the truth. What leaves say what? How to tell each tale of each Sibyl? What do the veins of the leaves reveal? How do we know what is true? What is myth, layers of folk tales, direct link to the divine? It's How we read the light. The golden October directional rays shifting to spring slants throughout the short shadows of winter, blunt rendering of truth. Prayers answered, divine voices listened to. Compass set right again to true north. Thank you, chorus, hosannahs to the highest, in excelsis deo. Did she give the recipe for gelato with the leaves? The Armani secrets of couture, were they depicted in the leaves, in the underworld? How did she know? Reading the veins, tracing patterns of each intersecting century. A geological survey of truth."

Sibyl Rubottom, colophon: "... to the father I never knew who named me Sibyl hoping I would be shrewd in business. That did not occur, but I did end up making books."
$1,500

Engineer's Rosary
By Sibyl Rubottom
San Diego, California: Bay Park Press, 2005. Edition of 150 copies.

5.25 x 7" Title label on front cover fixed in 2.25 x.25" metal holder. Colophon printed on single 4.9 x 6" sheet. 1.5" circular tags (size of tag varies) tied to spine binding. Tags hand printed.

Sibyl Rubottom: "Last spring my friend Dan's father, Tom, retired after being in business for 50 years as a structural engineer. His office was across the street from my press, Bay Park Press. Tom and his partner, Ed, invited us over to buy their flat files they were getting rid of.

"As I stood in the office I saw a wall of drafting plans in rolls with a tag hanging off every one. It was an incredible 'installation' just as it was. I felt very moved by it. I asked what they would do with the plans and tags. They said they had kept them for 'X' years as an archive, but now these were all going to the dump. I asked if I could have the tags.

"For the next few weeks Ed came over every few days to deliver a bag of tags. I couldn't bear that this 'tagged' life's work that comprised an architectural history of San Diego would be thrown away. Some tags even touch on my history, like 'Married Student Housing UCSD.' Some reflect Dan's summer jobs, and others just invoke a sense of wonder - 'The House of Charm.'

"I like the sound this book makes and how the tags 'puddle' when the book is stood up. There are so many tags left, and countess approaches to using them occur to me, but this version serves as my offering, my 'Engineer's Rosary'."
$120

Ten Elephants
By Sibyl Rubottom
2004. Edition of 15.

Ten hand tinted etchings on Fabriano paper.

Sibyl Rubottom: "Each book of 15 is a meditation and a remover of obstacles for the artist."
$500