Janet Cook-Rutnik Brings The Book Project to CMCArts April 12

St. John artist Janet Cook-Rutnik will bring The Book Project to the Caribbean Museum Center for the Arts in Frederiksted at 5 p.m., Friday, April 12, in conjunction with the annual VI Literary Festival and Book Fair. The public is cordially invited to attend the exhibition and presentations by invited authors, musicians, poets and performers. There will be book signings and sales as well as readings by many of the authors. The event will go until 10 p.m.
For more information about the VI Literary Festival and Book Fair visit the website: https://usvilitfest.com/2019-schedule-of-events/

In the artist’s statement Cook-Rutnik says, “The Book Project evolved out of a desire to free myself up from challenging conceptual idea-driven work and to just manipulate color and paint on a surface to see where it took me. I discovered that a ton of hardcover books were about to be disposed of since the jails — a normal repository for discarded books — will not take hardcover books.

It was hard for me at first to desecrate these books with paint as I love books and think reading is one of the greatest pleasures on earth. As I read the frontispieces I would be stopped in my tracks by the quotes and supposed intent of the author, but these were great surfaces for paint and I had to remind myself that they had had their day and were destined for the trash heap so in repurposing them I was giving them a new life as one of a kind, original paintings. Another title for the Book Project that came to mind as I worked was the Library of Incongruous. The book is a painting, the painting is a book.”

This exhibition premiered at Bajo el Sol on St. John in March.