Maureen Cummins ~ New York

The Poetics (of Torture)
By Maureen Cummins
High Falls, New York: Maureen Cummins, 2011. Edition of 25.

1.5 x 11" closed, 12 x 16" open; 34 pages. Fan shaped. Screw hinge. Housed in a 12.5 x3.75 x 1.75" cloth covered box.

Maureen Cummins: "The artist created an everyday object which, like euphemistic language, is used to cool and comfort us. Color, placement of type, and the fact that the book/fan had a light front and a dark back, come together in a visually dramatic way. The fan design that Cummins created was inspired by and based upon models in the collection of master printer and mentor Kathy Caraccio.

"During the years 1999 and 2000, Maureen Cummins delved into the subject of torture, studying the methods used throughout history to cause pain, injury, and death. Two projects emerged from that work: the first, Stocks and Bonds, documented the relationship between torture and economics. The second, Femmes Fatales, playfully illustrated a pattern that the artist had noticed - that when torture devices are given nicknames, they are exclusively feminine (witness The Iron Maiden, The Scavenger's Daughter, The Bride of Nuremburg, etc.). She also made note of another pattern: that torturers distance themselves from their victims by referring to their own actions in euphemistic terms. Thus, The 'Spiritual Séance' refers to the entire torture ritual in Brazil; 'Torches in the Night' refers to a method of execution (recently used in Rwanda) in which captives are covered in tar and set on fire; 'the Dew Breaker' was the name given to men who enforced the Duvalier regime in Haiti (they often appeared before dawn to arrest citizens); 'Nacht und Nebel,' or 'Night and Fog,' was a directive issued by the Nazi regime in 1941, which resulted in the kidnapping and disappearance of known political activists in all German-occupied territories. The list goes on.

"In The Poetics (of Torture) Cummins juxtaposes these phrases with language that has, in recent years, entered the American lexicon. Torture methods used by the CIA have been referred to in official government documents as 'alternative interrogation techniques,' 'special methods of questioning,' and 'enhanced coercive techniques.' 'Black sites' refer to secret CIA prisons where methods such as 'waterboarding' (simulated drowning), 'sleep management' (sleep deprivation), and the 'stress position' (in which a detainee is forced to stand immobile, with hands held at the sides for hours at a time) are routinely used on captives without legal or political recourse."
$950

Salem Lessons
Poems by Nicole Cooley
Design by Maureen Cummins
New York: Maureen Cummins, 2010. Edition of 30.

7 x 8"; 45 pages. Poems offset printed onto Fabriano Ingres paper. Red Titles printed letterpress. Images silkscreened onto Johannot paper. Laid into letterfold portfolio bound in cloth.

Maureen Cummins: "Salem Lessons, which was printed and produced by Maureen Cummins in the winter and spring of 2010, is the result of a decade-long collaboration between Cummins and the poet Nicole Cooley, inspired by discoveries that each made while working, at separate times, as resident artists within the archives of the American Antiquarian Society. (The two met after Cummins was repeatedly told by staff librarians that she was requesting the very same materials that Cooley had.) The resulting project pairs Cooley's poems with images from a child's penmanship book in order to trace the psychic reverberations of the Salem witch trials upon succeeding generations. The work simultaneously addresses – as all examinations of the trials inevitably do – our own modern time and situation.

“At the heart of Salem Lessons is the cycle of poems that Nicole Cooley created specifically for this project; each one written from the voice and perspective of one of the participants in the trials. There are thirteen poems altogether, representing accusers and accused, survivors and condemned, but focusing primarily – as the trials themselves did – on the women. The poems, which draw upon the visceral language of the original testimonials, are bewitching – written with the taut control, quiet layering of detail, and devastating power that Cooley's work is known for.

“The accompanying images are from a child's copy book kept by a ten-year-old Salem boy, Josiah Peele, during the years 1808 and 1809. What fascinated Cummins about this book, discovered within the Penmanship Collection at AAS, was that the sayings it contained were nothing like the innocent homilies typically found in copy books of the time, such as Do unto others as you would that they should do unto you. These were stern and biblical commandments – Abandon Evil Company, Fear to Do Evil, Deal Justly with All, Do Nothing Wicked – that spoke directly to the catastrophic events that had occurred in the town only generations before. In the re-created lesson book that Cummins and Cooley conceived of, the poems serve to illustrate these decorative penmanship pages, rather than the reverse. Thus, Guide your Tongue inspired the poem about Sarah Goode, whose open defiance and damning words in the face of Judge Hathorne - God will give you Blood to Drink - sealed her fate. Mind Your Book prompted a poem about Goode's twelve-year-old accuser, Ann Putnam, Jr., who swore that she had signed the devil's book, but fourteen years later requested a book of my confessing in which she wrote, I desire to lie in the dust and earnestly beg forgiveness.

“Bound into covers made from vintage writing slates, much like those that Josiah Peele would have used. In the context of this work, the use of such a fragile material alludes to the fragility of the world and the need to take care. The box which houses the book, as well as the hinges which hold the pages together, are decorated with the 'marks' of the trial's accusers, illiterate Salem citizens who were unable to sign their actual names.”
$1,300

Divide & Conquer
By Maureen Cummins
Easton, Pennsylvania: Experimental Printmaking Studio at Lafayette College, 2007. Edition of 40.

This limited-edition print project, Divide & Conquer, was designed by Maureen Cummins with typographic assistance by Kathleen McMillan. Production was funded by the Experimental Printmaking Institute at Lafayette College, with additional support from the Friends of Skillman Library. All editioning was completed on site at EPI by Jase Clark. To produce the printed pieces, multiple layers of text and imagery were hand silkscreened onto sheets of Arches Cover, then hand-colored. The images used for the prints are period photographs and engravings collected by the artist. Many of the portraits are reproduced here by kind permission of the New York Historical Society & the Schomburg Center For Research in Black Culture. The portfolios that house the prints were produced by Portfolio Box of Pawtucket, Rhode Island.

Colophon: "The text of this project is excerpted from a manuscript that the artist discovered while in residency at the American Antiquarian Society in the fall of 2000. The handwritten pages, which numbered over three hundred in length, comprised the transcript for a series of congressional hearings held in 1871. The purpose of the hearings was to gain information about the activities of the group known at that time as the Ku Klux, a widespread organization that was responsible for a virtual reign of terror throughout the south in the decades following the civil war. The transcripts bear witness not only to the horrific acts of the KK, but also to the way in which they divided a community along racial lines by targeting anyone who resisted their vision of racial separation and white supremacy.

The physical form of this project is based on the Exquisite Corpse – a literary game invented in the early twentieth century by the surrealists. In the game, each player took a turn writing on a piece of paper, then folded it so that only the last word would show, and passed it on to the next player for his or her contribution. The game was later adapted to drawing and collage."

Maureen Cummins: "My current project, Divide and Conquer, makes use of the early history of the Klan - referred to at the time as the Ku Klux – as a way to explore ideas about race, class, identity and human relationships.

The physical form of the prints - inspired by the Exquisite Corpse, a game invented by the Surrealists – gives the reader/viewer the power to align and combine the printed elements in a variety of different and thought-provoking ways. I also draw upon the visual language of toys and games (the figures in my prints are meant to resemble paper dolls) to illustrate the way in which individuals were objectified and communities torn apart, divided or destroyed by the Ku Klux.

Simultaneously I celebrate the lives of those individuals who, by simple acts of humanity, defied the KK's vision of racial separation and white supremacy, then later had the courage to collectively tell their stories, redefining what community could be. I have used imagery reminiscent of halos and crowns to surround these figures, who for me are like modern-day saints or martyrs."
$1,500

The Flag Project
By Maureen Cummins
New York: 2006. Edition of 50.

11 x 14.75 x 1.5" bound in black cloth. Each verso page contains two columns of letterpress printed text; every facing page is illustrated with a reproduction of one of the original silkscreen flag prints. The typeface used was Gill Sans, set in monotype by Michael Bixler at his letter foundry in Skaneateles, NY. All text and titling was letterpress printed onto sheets of Somerset Velvet by Michael Russem of Kat Ran Press. The images are Epson prints, reproduced from original screenprints by Joseph Ng of Basic Pictures. Mark Tomlinson designed the binding structure and bound the edition.

In commemoration of the fifth anniversary of September 11th, 2001, "The Flag Project" is a visual and textual narrative that documents the artist's experience as an American during the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks.

Prospectus: "Cummins visually deconstructs the American flag - altering and mutating the national symbol to reinforce themes within her narrative. Stripes become lines of text; fields of stars are replaced with flames, fingerprints, human eyes, faces. The flag changes color, and orientation, and metamorphoses into other contemporary icons and motifs: a skull-and-cross bones, a fallout shelter symbol, a white flag of surrender."

Maureen Cummins: "The Flag Project came out of a critical time in my own life, and a time of crisis in the life of my country. It was borne of personal change, and has led to a new approach to my work, one in which I address issues directly rather than through the lens of history. Although in The Flag Project I touch upon themes that run throughout my work—the history of violence in America, the experience of marginalized groups, the conflict between individual and society, appearance versus reality—I have departed from my usual objective perspective and have developed this piece from an entirely personal perspective. I developed The Flag Project as a vehicle for exploration, a way to investigate the confused and often conflicted feelings I was having about myself and my own changing identity as a new mother, as well as my sense of myself as an American during a time of rising nationalism. I wanted to challenge representations being put forth by the media and the current administration of what it is to be an American, what American values, experiences and attitudes are. Not only did these words and images not reflect my own experience or reality, but I also questioned whether they truly represented anyone, if it was even possible in a country as diverse as the United States to have a national identity. It seemed to me that a personal memoir was the simplest and most powerful weapon that I, as an artist, could use in the face of rampant myths and stereotypes. Through memoir I hope to make the personal political."

CURRENT EVENTS II / Titanic
By Maureen Cummins
New York: Women's Studio Workshop, 2004. Edition of 20.

Twenty copies of the Wall Street Journal were overprinted with six silkscreen runs. Each copy is 48 pages, contains 25 eyewitness accounts. Current Events II / Titanic is the second in a series of altered newspapers produced by Maureen Cummins. The piece pairs eyewitness accounts with graphic images of a sinking ship in silhouette. Advertisements, headlines, and stock listings can be read through deeply saturated fields of midnight blue sky and seascape. Layers of time and meaning intersect spontaneously to create a palimpsest of poetic and political associations.

On April 10, 1912 the greatest ship ever built, the Titanic, was launched on her maiden voyage. No cost had been spared in her construction or in the outfitting of her opulent compartments. For the millionaires, captains-of-industry and honeymoon couples who sailed with her, the Titanic promised the ultimate in luxury, status and social privilege. As she sailed across the Atlantic, the Titanic carried with her the dreams and aspirations of the civilized world. She was the very embodiment of the most cherished beliefs of her age – a limitless faith in science, technological progress, and man’s ability to prevail over brute nature. In publicity material from the time, the Titanic was described as the greatest achievement of the Anglo-Saxon race. Her owners, The White Star Line, declared her to be "unsinkable."

Five days later, on April 15, 1912 at 11:45 p.m., the Titanic grazed an iceberg in the North Atlantic and was fatally pierced through her starboard side. When she sank, two and a half hours later, 1,513 lives were lost with her. Her fate, and the succession of human errors that sealed it, shocked the world. The Titanic had not been equipped with a searchlight. The number of lifeboats on board was grossly inadequate. Her crew had never been drilled in how to lower and launch the boats. Her distress signals were seen by a nearby ship, but dismissed as being too improbable. The Titanic, a ship that had been built as a monument to man’s power and supremacy, came to be synonymous with human folly and mortality.

Current Events II / Titanic retells the story of the Titanic’s last hours from the perspective of the ship’s survivors. Drawing upon original memoirs published shortly after the disaster, the artist weaves together a chorus of voices to create a narrative reminiscent of Greek tragedy. Like the mythic ship herself, each statement of disbelief and denial looms larger than life, reverberating through time and resonating with the reader’s own personal experience and political world. Current Events II / Titanic seeks to capture the greater significance of the Titanic disaster – an event that haunts our consciousness not because it is a nightmare catastrophe from another time, but because it is our own waking reality.
$1,500

Anatomy of Insanity
By Maureen Cummins
High Falls, New York: Maureen Cummins, 2008. Edition of 30.

8.5 x 12"; 50 pages.

Maureen Cummins: "Anatomy of Insanity documents the gendered beliefs about insanity that existed in the nineteenth century and which inform our attitudes about men, women, and mental health to this day (e.g., the common use of the word ‘hysterical’ to describe women, a word whose root meaning is ‘womb’).

The book was inspired by and based upon hundreds of patient records that the artist examined in the archive of McLean Hospital. (Founded in 1818, McLean was renowned as one of the first, and most progressive mental hospitals built in this country; more recently it has become known for the number of brilliant artists who became-to use their own words-‘graduates’: Sylvia Plath, Robert Lowell, Ray Charles, and Susanna Kaysen, among others.) These handwritten records, contained in oversized, white linen-bound books, revealed a disturbing pattern: while the causal explanations given for the insanity of the male patients were widely diverse-diseases of the body or brain, love matters, domestic strife, the death of a loved one, professional stress, business failure, masturbation, etc.-the majority of causal explanations given for the female patients were rooted in the female body: "lactation," "abortion," "parturition and lactation," "suppression of menses," "amenorrhea," "hysteria," "critical time of life," "old maidism," etc.

“In Anatomy of Insanity, the artist re-presents medical data in a playful way, using humor to draw her readers in to material that is dark and disturbing, inviting them to examine the underlying assumption behind these diagnoses: that while men went crazy for a variety of reasons, women went crazy because they were women."
(SOLD)

Cherished, Beloved, and Most Wanted
By Maureen Cummins
High Falls, New York: Maureen Cummins, 2009. Edition of 12 variants.

Materials: found antique photograph albums, found photographs. Each photo album is unique and includes a separate archival envelope, the "rejected" family photographs it once contained. Album photographs laser printed. Title page letterpress printed. Limitation or colophon letterpress printed.

Maureen Cummins: "Altered Victorian photo albums are paired with reproductions of mug shots from a police ledger, circa 1930. These textless books are experimental rather than didactic (other than title and colophon pages, the book is comprised of photographic spreads) and inspire in the viewer a process of examination, out of which questions and observations - about history, crime, the family, and the process of collecting itself - naturally arise.

"The photo albums used for this project are decorative to the point of decadence: constructed of rich materials such as brass, velvet and celluloid, they also contain highly ornate (and largely feminine) iconography - floral borders, roses, cherubs, and maidens - which are meant to both exalt and domesticate the portraits contained within. However, when the viewer opens the album to find it filled with stark photographs of numbered men, their heads held in place by devices that resemble instruments of torture, the effect is emotionally unsettling. These men clearly 'do not belong,' either in cherished photo albums, or society at large.

"Ironically however, the cabinet cards originally intended for these albums (thick photographic cards depicting cherished friends and family members) are now virtually worthless, while convict photos have become a rare and costly collectible. By placing them within prized family photo albums, the artist alludes not only to this telling fact of material culture, but to a myriad of related phenomenon: the Freudian analysis of language and imagery by criminal groups, and our own inconsistent attitude about crime and criminals. While we fear and demonize criminals, we are also secretly fascinated by them, often to the point of celebration: we adopt glamorous figures such as Jesse James, Billy the Kid, and Bonnie and Clyde, claiming them as part of our cultural heritage, at the same time that we disown, deny, and revile other common or less romantic criminals.

"Meanwhile, the quiet pleasure provided by leafing through family photo albums has been replaced by our obsessive involvement with mass media. Violence is our new entertainment; and criminal families from the Corleones to the Sopranos have entered our hearts and homes, inviting us to pore over their images and recall their words and deeds with fondness."
(SOLD)

Click individual image to enlarge

Ghost Diary
By Maureen Cummins
New York: Maureen Cummins, 2002. Edition of 25.

5 x 7 x 3”; 22 pages. Concertina structure. Pages constructed from vintage glass negatives. Brass hinges. Titling on the spine.

Here again Cummins has done some heavy historical research initiated by the discovery of a letter written in 1807 by Colonel Jonathan Rhea, a former Revolutionary War officer. It was edited to form the text of Ghost Diary, a unique document of American History that has not been published heretofore.

The letter, in the form of a memoir, was written to Colonel Rhea's five children on the anniversary of their mother's death. Rhea's ancestors were some of the first settlers of New Jersey.

This artists book is constructed of glass panes hinged together to form a concertina structure. The image pages are vintage glass negatives, portraits of anonymous individuals and family groupings; dating from the late 19th century. These photographs are haunting and serve to visually complement the book. The delicate brass hinges that secure the pages have a slate gray patina to match the glass negatives. The sheer physical weight of this book attests to its importance.
(SOLD)