The Death of a Beautiful Subject

The Death of a Beautiful Subject is a new book by Sophy Rickett, featuring an accidental archive of photographs of butterflies taken by her retired father, extracts drawn from an email dialogue between them, and a narrative text written by the artist.

The 24 photographs featured in the book have been retouched by the artist so as to conceal and obscure her father’s original subject matter. Through this deliberate and provocative reworking and re-presentation of her father’s photographs, Rickett aims to question assumptions about the nature of collaboration, exploring notions of authorship and consent as well as the fluidity of meaning.