Library

The Book Art Museum is a library of knowledge about the history and the future of a book. In fact it is a library of “books about books” which have been collected since the beginning of the museum. Most of the books, due to the poor condition of the building (leaking roof, for example) are stored in boxes. Library equipment is being collected as well (mainly donations), however not as intensely as we would like due to the unclear legal status of the building. The “Library of books about books” is waiting for administration decisions and so far it has been created virtually. It consists of Polish and German “books about books” donated to BAM in 2011 by professor Alfred Świerk from Mainz (more than 1200 items), of Polish and foreign publications collected by the Tryznos, as well as the catalogues of the book art exhibitions collected by Alicja Słowikowska. The main themes are: technologies (printing, binding, paper-making), history of a book (of writing, illustrating, ornamenting), history of art (artists, styles, trends), new media (e-books, experiments), encyclopedias, compendia, dictionaries. At the moment there are but two registers available: the one made by Dominika Biernat for her MA thesis, and of the books donated by professor Alfred Świerk. The direct access to the books will be possible after the renovation, when a few rooms will be prepared for this function. The OK'ART library is a separate part of the “library of books about books”; it both collects and initiate publications “about artist's books”. It consists of critical papers accessible non-abridged at the Museum website. The first papers were written as referring to the collection of “Polish artists' books from the end of the 20th and the beginning of the 21st centuries”. The OK'ART Library will enlarge as new papers are sent from Poland and abroad. The texts will be in Polish and English.