Music Box
Photography by Jim Camp.
Published 2012 by the synaesthesia press.
Approximately 6¼ inches square. Thirty original giclée photographic prints laid into a found cardboard box. Accompanied by a letterpress-printed wraparound band, printed cover, translucent frontispiece bearing a quotation by Jack Gilbert, and a repurposed vintage library card pocket used as a tabbed folder containing the colophon.
Edition of 26 lettered copies.
Music Box grew out of a trip to Memphis, Tennessee, for Gonerfest 9, the annual music festival hosted by Goner Records. Using a Canon PowerShot S95, Jim Camp photographed performers, audiences, and moments surrounding the festival over several days in September 2012.
Rather than presenting the photographs in a conventional book format, Camp assembled them as an found box, combining original photographic prints with found materials, letterpress ephemera, and handmade elements. The result functions simultaneously as photographic portfolio, music document, archive, and object.
The thirty photographs included in the edition document a range of performers appearing at Gonerfest 9, including The Oblivians, NOBUNNY, White Mystery, Bad Sports, Bobby Hussy, and Bits of Shit, among others. Together they form a visual record of one of independent music’s most influential annual gatherings.
The wraparound band, frontispiece, and accompanying printed materials were letterpress printed at Letterpress Central with the assistance of Cindy and Gary Iverson. Cindy Iverson also assisted in the design and production of the cover materials.
Photography, design, letterpress printing and assembly by Jim Camp.
