Ad Libitum

This work, titled Ad Libitum- borrowed from medieval Latin meaning “In accordance with one’s wishes.”, is a collection of four mixed media books made entirely by hand. Each book is a four page spread containing text written by the artist, drawing from works such as Audre Lorde’s The Uses Of The Erotic, Amiri Baraka’s Systems of Dante’s Hell, and Keith Smith’s Text In The Book Format, in order to work through notions of agency, nature, time, sensation, and expression. The text was created as a byproduct of using stream of consciousness journaling as a tool to process emotions and changes, trimmed down, and given new life so that the redacted text within the books can open up space for the reader to play a game of fill in the blank. Perhaps this game can in turn act as a tool for the reader(s) to think through their own thoughts and emotions, if not just take their mind off of the outside world for a moment.