A Day Book

Artist Ronald B. Kitaj (American, 1932 - 2007)

Author Robert Creeley (American, born 1926)

Date1972

MediumOriginal prints: 10 screenprints in colors (incl. 7on variously colored laid papers, 1 on canvas, 1 on blue acetate, the title page, and wrappers); 4 etchings in black, brown or blind on white wove paper with added screenprinting in colors; 1 lithograph on Arches white wove paper. Text: letterpress from zinc blocks on wove paper in various colors

ClassificationBooks

Credit LineGift of Molly and Walter Bareiss

Object number

1984.610

Not on View

Label TextR. B. Kitaj, A Day Book. Text by Robert Creeley (1972) Robert Creeley dropped out of Harvard in the 1940s, founded Divers Press to publish contemporary poetry, and taught at Black Mountain College in North Carolina. He was editor of the influential literary journal, Black Mountain Review. He published several dozen poetry books, a collection of stories, a novel, and two collections of experimental prose. Ronald Brooks Kitaj was born in Cleveland and studied at the Royal College of Art, London. He has been linked to the Pop Art movement of the 1960s. The two met at a poetry reading in London in the 1960s. Kitaj considered Creeley’s poetry a turning point in his understanding of letters—symbols he frequently introduces into his prints and paintings. For A Day Book, Kitaj asked Creeley to provide a text that would be the basis for a sequence of prints. Creeley wanted it to be “long enough” and hit upon the number thirty. So A Day Book is precisely what it says it is: 30 pages of writing done over 30 days. Creely describes it as “a literal record of the day’s activities and thoughts, without attempt to understand or digest or to reflect upon them.” Each text page is printed on a different color with a different typeface, a strategy suited to the arbitrary time structure. Kitaj then chose individual lines from several of the pages, which became intrinsic parts of his images.Published Referencescf. Hogben, Carol, Rowan Watson, editors, From Manet to Hockney: Modern Artists’ Illustrated Books, London, 1985, no. 150

cf. Cappellazzo, Amy and Elizabeth Licata, ed., In Company: Robert Creeley's Collaborations, Niagara Falls NY, Castellani Art Museum, 1999, p.13-15, repr. p.14 & 15.

cf. Johnson, Robert Flynn, Artists' Books in the Modern Era 1870--2000: The Reva and David Logan Collection of Illustrated Books, San Francisco, 2001, no. 158.

Exhibition HistoryToledo Museum of Art, Splendid Pages: The Molly and Walter Bareiss Collection of Modern Illustrated Books, Feb. 14--May 11, 2003.