Henry Miller was a big influence back when I was banging on an Olivetti. The man spewed pure spirit and humanist life-lust. Tropic of Cancer was an autobiographical  novel Miller spun in his head while wandering the streets of Brooklyn. Even before he’d written a word he was a writer.  When he finally produced Tropic  in Paris it wasn’t just controversial—the book was banned. There’s a lot of rich lit-history surrounding it and I’m looking forward to reading Frederick Turner’s new book from  Yale University Press.

Check it out on Amazon here.

ADDENDUM:
Writers and readers in search of inspiration will find no better source than Miller’s The Books in My Life

“Midnight Mass” is the rare “Plate 1” in artist Norman Conquest’s seminal Church of the Trans-Fat place mat series. [Click on image and pray for  larger view.]

Conquest began his mixed media church work in 2006, and it remains in-progress. In addition to 26 laminated place mats, there’s a pamphlet  bible, Church of the Trans-Fat.  [Click on image and pray for larger view.]

There are various “suitable for framing” church membership certificates, including the one below. [Click on image and pray for larger view.]

Also, post cards, tax deductible donor flags, church membership ID, and not-for-the-squeamish ephemera.

Aisle of Light (2010).

CTF poster (2012)

Last but not least… a limited edition CTF boxed product: Partially Hydrogenated Communion Wafers. [Click on image and pray for larger view.]

You’ll find more CTF examples and past works here.  For additional information about the artist you can e-mail me here.

Click on image and pray for larger view

Conquest explained that this was an act of art, not vandalism, but the agent just didn’t get it. He demanded to know how many dollars had been mailed.

“Only one,” Conquest assured him, “that’s all I could afford.”

The agent didn’t find this funny and said the FBI would be back in contact soon. The artist was left to wonder whether he’d be arrested.

As it turned out, he never heard back from the FBI.

Since his friend never received the dollar, he decided to commemorate the event. He stole a huge promotional poster from the Grand Central branch post office and collaged it. It included an enlarged facsimile of the mailed moolah and a faked postmark.

Below is a photograph of the final framed artwork titled “We Deliver. Sometimes.”

Click on image for larger view.

“Naked Lunch” (NYC, ca. 1990). Book-object by Norman Conquest. Mixed media: sliced Olympia Press edition of Naked Lunch, glass eye and fork on black plate in painted wood display stand.

Click on image for large view.

Photograph by Rineke Dijkstra from her “Beach Portraits” series. See the feature in PDN.

LINK

3-De Sade (1979). Book-object by Norman Conquest. Mixed media: book, blood, and spike. One of three examples.  [photo: bps]

Having seen this work up close, I can report that the spike driven through the cover served to elevate the edition as a display stand.

According to the artist this was not intentional, but “a fortuitous perk.”

More remarkable was how Conquest managed to achieve the nearly identical three-legged bloodstain on all three covers.

Rare relic (1990) commemorating  the anti-censorship art collective, Beuyscouts of Amerika—a collaboration between artists Anna Banana and Norman Conquest.

N.C. in SF circa 1987

LINK

“Beaming poems with automated page-flip is easy,” Conquest told me. “The technical hurdle is distribution and getting the damn bar code to work.”

Can one copyright a hologram?

“The Library of Congress has a special sky wing devoted to holograms.”

Will there eventually be a Kindle edition?

“We’re negotiating that.”

Will the book be expensive?

“Not if you’re Mitt Romney.”

Here’s the original paperback edition published by City Lights.

And here’s the Conquest work-in-progress.

The artist has promised to beam me a review copy as soon as it’s available.

Stay tuned.