Letter Box: The Geometry of Loss

Please join us on Friday October 9 at 7pm at the Center for Book Arts for an in-person event celebrating the launch of LETTER BOX: The Geometry of Loss, a stunning new cinematic book about dealing with loss, written by former New York Times reporter turned poet/book artist Rick Black, visualized by Center for Book Arts Honoree/Vis Lit pioneer Warren Lehrer. The spare poetic prose—which consists of only a few words per page—is choreographed for the stage of the page by a typographic setting that gives delicate and surprising form to the interior, emotional and metaphorical underpinnings of the text. LETTER BOX is published by the Center for Book Arts and EarSay. The night will begin with a multimedia performance/reading by Lehrer, followed by a conversation between Lehrer and CBA Director Corina Reynolds, followed by a signing and festivities.

Free. Seating is limited. Please RSVP.

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“LETTER BOX: The Geometry of Loss is a minimalist but cumulatively powerful text-and-images meditation on deep grief.”

Kirkus Reviews 

“This marvel of a book reads itself to you as you turn the pages. It is, in reality, a box of letters that spells ‘G-R-I-E-F’ in a way that is poem, angel’s song, recipe. In LETTER BOX, art and language dance as you understand that you, too, can put your own letters, words, memories into the box. We have all experienced loss, been stymied by grief. LETTER BOX opens its arms to you as you place your grief inside.”

Bob Holman, Poet, Poetry Activist and Chronicler, Founder: Bowery Poetry Club

“There is something quite profound and generous in LETTER BOX—a choreography between word, form, silence, image, and geometry—that speaks in ways language alone cannot. After reading it, shapes, colors, feelings, vibrations, and sensations are still moving within me, alongside specific and nonspecific memories of grief and trauma I’ve either encountered personally or professionally, in my clients, or within the collective field. Many will find themselves feeling seen, felt, recognized, understood, and thus gently accompanied through its pages, inviting readers into a collective realm of loss and support for their own paths of integration and healing.” 

Selma Quist-Møller, Lead Psychologist on Post Traumatic Growth, Reimagine

“LETTER BOX is a poignant collaboration between Rick Black’s tender personal story of love and loss and Warren Lehrer’s boldly cinematic visual treatment. Lehrer activates, magnifies, and interprets Black’s words with an abstract beauty and metaphoric resonance that allows their emotional power to jump in, out, and through his elegant graphic architecture—and right into our hearts.”

Alan Berliner, Filmmaker, Pennebaker Career Achievement Award, DOC NYC Visionary Award

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About the Presenters & Collaborators

Warren Lehrer is a writer and artist known as a pioneer in the fields of visual literature and design authorship. His books and multimedia projects are acclaimed for capturing the shape of thought and reuniting the oral and pictorial traditions of storytelling with the printed page. Honors include: The Ladislav Sutnar Lifetime Achievement Prize, Center for Book Arts Honoree, the Brendan Gill Prize, the Innovative Use of Archives Award, the Independent Publisher Outstanding Book of the Year Award, the International Book Award for Best New Fiction, three AIGA Book Awards, two Type Directors Club Awards, two Design Incubation Awards, a Media That Matters Award, and fellowships and grants from the NEA, NYFA, and the Rockefeller, Ford, Greenwall, and Furthermore Foundations. His work has been exhibited widely and is in many collections including MoMA, L.A. County Art Museum, The Getty Museum, The Walker Art Center, Pompidou Centre, and Tate Gallery. He is also a performer, animator, and has co- written four plays and one opera. Lehrer is a frequent presenter at universities, art and literary centers, and bookstores. He is a founding faculty member of the Designer As Author/Entrepreneur MFA program at SVA, Professor Emeritus at Purchase College, SUNY, Co-Founder with Judith Sloan of EarSay, a non-profit arts organization in Queens, NY. He is currently working on a history/survey of Visual Literature from cave painting to interactive, electronic poetry.

Rick Black is an award-winning poet, journalist, and book artist. A journalist for many years, Black worked overseas in the Jerusalem bureau of The Associated Press and The New York Times. He also contributed articles to The Los Angeles Times, The Boston Globe, The Chicago Tribune, The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Dallas Morning News, The Jerusalem Post, and many others. While he enjoyed reporting, he was intent on pursuing his love of literature and books. After studying at the Center for Book Arts, he won a fellowship for a letterpress printing and fine press publishing seminar. In 2005, he founded his own imprint, Turtle Light Press. His artist books are represented in private and public collections, including the Library of Congress, Yale Beinecke Library, U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, New York Public Library, and many others. Awards include: the Isaac Anolic Jewish Book Arts Award, the Split This Rock Best Poetry Book Award, Poetica Magazine's Poetry Chapbook Prize for Contemporary Jewish Writing, and the James W. Hackett Award from the British Haiku Society. His poems and translations have appeared in The Atlanta Review, Midstream, U.S. 1 Worksheets, Frogpond, Cricket, RawNervz, Blithe Spirit, Still, and other journals. A New Jersey native, Black now lives in Arlington, Virginia, with his wife. He teaches at Pyramid Atlantic Arts Center in Hyattsville, MD, the Smith Center for Healing and the Arts in Washington, DC, and gives talks and workshops at universities, libraries, and synagogues. 

Corina Reynolds is the Executive Director of Center for Book Arts in New York City. At CBA, she has focused on connecting artists across distance and time through a diverse program of exhibitions, panels, conferences, and classes. Her passion for the art of the book has led her to curate exhibitions, organize conferences and panels, publish books, and teach about the book arts in the US and abroad. She has an MFA in textiles from Cranbrook Academy of Art and, in 2012, she co-founded Small Editions, an artists’ book publisher and curatorial residency program in Brooklyn, NY with the goal to expand the public understanding of artist’s books. During her time at Small Editions she published over 30 artists’ books which are now held in some of the most prestigious public and private collections across the globe, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Museum of Modern Art, and the Whitney Museum of American Art. Over the years she has overseen the production of hundreds of books including books about artists’ books, design, architecture, photography, and contemporary art. In 2021, she and two collaborators founded Book Art Review, a serial publication that ventures to develop, diversify, and propel critical discourse in the book arts.