The artist book Ascending/Descending Sonic Shadows (2019) is a companion work to an ascending score based on echolocation training, which Fayen d’Evie created to frame a processional encounter with Bill Fontana’s Sonic Shadows installation at SFMOMA in July 2017. It was the first of a succession of sensorial scores that d’Evie introduced to explore ways that blindness could orient new forms of encounter with the SFMOMA collection, and new approaches to archiving ephemeral or degrading works.

Ascending/Descending Sonic Shadows (2019) incorporates laser cut cover, tactile screenprints and blind embossing, and braille and print colophons. It can be read front to back (following the embossed ascent), or back to front (following the printed ascent), or back and forth (a perpetually circulating ascent or descent).

The book is an experiment with the tactile potential of print, that opens new space for technical innovations and and conceptual conversations to nuance how print feels. The ascending score trained attentiveness towards the quietest sound. Echoing that score in print form, the book invites readers to feel for the quietest shifts in texture and composition across a page. The book is also an investigation into ways that print can expand the agency of blind and Deaf audiences by offering pathways for trans-sensory conversation.

Ascending/Descending Sonic Shadows (2019) is held in artist book collections of the National Gallery of Victoria, Deakin University, and SFMOMA.

To listen and read more about the broader project, visit Re-locating Echoes Issue 1: Ascending Sonic Shadows.

Photopolymer relief and embossing with Braille and laser-cut soft cover.
Paper stocks: BFK Rives 250 gsm (relief and embossing), Ball & Doggett Colourplan 270 gsm (Braille) and Arches HP 300 gsm (soft cover)
DimensionsL 29.5 x 23 cm, 48 pages.
Edition of 30, including:
6 artist proofs, 6 exhibition reading copies, and 2 donated to braille libraries.

Ascending/Descending Sonic Shadows (2019) was launched at the exhibition Re-locating Echoes, Negative Press, 26 Oct - 23 Nov 2019

The book was featured in an exhibition for the Experimental Print Prize at Castlemaine Art Museum, 5 Dec 2019 - 10 May 2020