2006 Portfolio Prize Runner Up: Cara Barer

Finding potential in an abandoned, soiled copy of the Yellow Pages, Cara Barer began The Book Project, and proceeded to transform a hodgepodge of volumes into pieces of sculptural beauty. In doing so, she presents a different take on the handmade artist’s book. 

Several images in the series evoke movement: the soft, swift phfft, phfft, phfft of flipping pages. Others are a Rorschach-like test for finding man-made as well as organic forms: is the pattern of curlicues and tendrils more like an ornate gateway or a root system in search of water?

Some of the books are found, some are bought at discount, still others are donated by friends who are curious to see what the artist might create. Barer submerges or sprays the volumes with water, and uses everything from hair rollers to Velcro to manipulate them into the desired forms. She shoots digitally, and depending on the pallor of the book and the background, the images may have a sepia tone or appear in stark black and white.

Fanciful and symbolic, the series alludes to the status of the book in contemporary times. “My photographs are a lament for the passing of eras when books were considered much more valuable, and a path to knowledge,” says Barer.

Cara Barer lives and works in Houston. She has degrees from the Glassell School of Art at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, and the Art Institute of Houston. Her work was recently included in Photography Now: One Hundred Portfolios (Wright State University Art Galleries, Dayton, Ohio, 2006).