The show Binding Desire opens today at Otis College of Art & Design in LA.

The very large show Binding Desire: Unfolding Artists Book opens with a reception this evening in LA at the Ben Maltz Gallery at Otis. The show runs from January 25th through March 30th and has many related events happening during the length of the show. If you would like to see the website for details about the show and the related events, please click here.

Binding Desire: Unfolding Artists Books is a group exhibition featuring approximately 120 works from OTIS Millard Sheets Library’s Special Collection of 2,100 artists books dating from the 1960s to the present.  The Otis Artists‘ Book Collection is one of the largest in Southern California. It houses a wide range of works representing every genre of artists‘ books by such luminaries as Vito Acconci, Joseph Beuys, and Ed Ruscha, as well as significant works from major centers of production like Beau Geste Press, Paradise Press, Printed Matter, Red Fox Press, and Woman‘s Studio Workshop. A foundational strength of the collection is its holdings of artists books made in the 1960s and 1970s—a time when this material was often not collected by libraries because so much of it was hard to define, catalog and house. The exhibition also includes a reading room showcasing new work produced by OTIS students in the Fall 2013 semester. 

Work by: Kim Abeles, Sally Alatalo, Booklyn Artists Alliance, Ant Farm, Emily Artinian, Molly Barker, Michael Bartalos, Carol June Barton, Larry Bell, Barbara Bloom, Sarah Bryant, David Bunn, Chris Burden, Macy Chadwick, Rebecca Chamlee, Julie Chen, Laurie Whitehill Chong, C&C Press/Matt Cohen and Sher Zabaszkiewicz, Billy Collins, Critical Art Ensemble, Joyce Cutler-Shaw, Johanna Drucker, Mary Beth Edelson, Sam Erenberg, Carol Es, Daniel Essig, Eugene Feldman, Fly, Charles Henri Ford, Annette Gates, Cheri Gaulke, Amy Gerstler, Conrad Gleber, Fred Hagstrom, Karen Hanmer, Romano Hänni, George Herms, Dick Higgins, Tatana Kellner, Ronald King, Susan E. King, Ellen Knudson, Karen S. Kunc, Cynthia Lollis, Ken Leslie, Paul Etienne Lincoln, Margot Lovejoy, Sue Maberry, Barbara Maloutas, Cynthia Marsh, Scott McCarney, Paul McCarthy, Marshall McLuhan, Clifton Meador, Bruce Nauman, Katherine Ng, Bonnie Thompson Norman, Robert Oberhand, Dain Olsen, Lisa Onstad, Dennis Oppenheim, Laura Owens, Gary Panter, Werner Pfeiffer, Amy Pirkle, Arnoldo Pomodoro, Rachel Rosenthal, Sue Ann Robinson, Dieter Roth, Edward Ruscha, Niki de Saint Phalle, David Sandlin, Wilbur H. Schilling, Carolee Schneemann, Anat Shalev, Buzz Spector, Annie Sprinkle, Jana Sim, Alexis Smith, Jessica Spring, David Stairs, Gary Sweeney, Jennifer Tee, Barbara Tetenbaum, Beth Thielen, Fred Tomaselli, Rae Trujillo, Jeffrey Vallance, Paul Vangelisti, Kara Walker, Pamela S. Wood, J. Meejin Yoon, Philip Zimmermann, Marilyn Zornado.

If you are in the Los Angeles area during the time the show is up, I hope you will go by and check it out.