Joe D'Ambrosio ~ Arizona

The Diamond Wager
by Joseph D'Ambrosio
2005. Edition of 35.

2.5 x 3" miniature book bound into box. Diamond-patterned gray cloth boards. In the middle of the front/top is a faceted round of reflective silver. The diamond pattern cuts through to the title page. After the title page, a page with the same reflective material in diamond shapes but with cutouts to the page behind to reveal colors of violet, fuchsia, and blue. In the center of the first double page of text is a six-sided pop-up. Set in digital 10 pt. Apple Chancery type and ink-jet printed (giclée) on Velin Arches paper.

D'Ambrosio's contemporary tale was inspired by Dashiell Hammet's 1929 short story of the same name. An ingenious example of using a range of techniques and skills available to the contemporary book artists - colored paper, colored type, pop-ups, expressive structure, collage - to illuminate and illustrate a text.
$125