SPBH Book Club Volume VI

SPBH Book Club VI is a forensic exploration of loss and renewal by artist Melinda Gibson.

During a fire at her South London studio, Gibson watched as smoke and water poured into the space. Her response at the time was instinctive and visceral, taping large format negatives to the walls, exposing them to these elements and watching as they abstracted, each one becoming an alluring record of what happened there. In the aftermath, she combed through what remained, analysing and photographing material and drawing it together in the form of a book. The making of the book itself became a cathartic process of understanding and survival.

In a ritualistic act of defiance, each book is ‘smoked’ by Gibson in a hand-built smokehouse and sealed in plastic to contain the scent – each one becoming a unique, sensorial object offering an experience that transcends the pages of the book.

Through investigating the event and re-staging it in small performative acts of satiation, this book is a way of containing the experience and making it hers.