Cool Hunting

"Imprint" is the first monograph from London-based artist and designer Daniel Eatock. The book chronicles a series of often personal, always conceptual projects that blur the line between art and commercial design. Written and arranged by the man himself, Imprint succeeds in depicting the diverse, scattered nature of his work. With no systematic structure, he litters the book's pages with almost 1,000 images of his various projects. The ongoing "Picture of the Week" project for instance, is depicted with a few small images on almost every page. The seemingly unrelated shots are intended to present "incidents, alignments, coincidences, viewpoints, temporary situations, and other small things that often go unnoticed." Many of these small things are not even photographed by the artist — though he does give due credit to the submitters — which reflects his commitment to the participatory project.

Eatock's other works range from simply collecting his fingernail clippings, to large-scale events like "The World's Largest Signed and Numbered Limed-Edition Artwork." The latter involved ten artists working every day for two weeks simply signing 1,000,000 individually numbered postcards (pictured below), which was later rejected by the Guinness Book because there was no applicable category.

Throughout the book, Eatock takes strides to make his document more than a just stack of colored paper. To make a more personal, unique monograph, each book bears his thumbprint. The artist went to the Indiana warehouse storing his books and inked each and every volume. He also included a page with a hand-drawn circle in every book. Randomly inserted by the printer at a different place in each book, it's meant to surprise the reader and add a level of uncertainty to the generally homogeneous process of mass book production.

Imprint is available for $60 at the Princeton Architectural Press store or Amazon. His exhibition, "Extra Medium," will also be displayed through September and October at Arcadia University in suburban Philadelphia.

Daniel Eatock: Extra Medium
18 September-26 October 2008
Arcadia University Art Gallery
Spruance Fine Arts Center
450 South Easton Road
Glenside, PA 19038 map
Tel. +1 215-572-2131