The Mechanism bookwork contains a selection of eight poems written by the artist – Sam Treadaway – between the ages of seventeen and twenty-one years. Although read and discussed with certain friends, they were eventually filed away and forgotten.
Then in 2011, whilst sorting through some possessions, Sam opened an old atlas to discover, tucked within its covers, a number of handwritten pages. Re-discovering and re-reading these poems he became intrigued by conceptual parallels and connections between its verse and artworks he had since created.
Therefore Sam decided to treat each poem as a score from which to make a graphite drawing. The drawings he proceeded to produce became encoded with semiotic references, both to the original poems as well as to various artworks and projects. The Mechanism monograph is the result of that process: a meditation on one period of life from that of another and an interdisciplinary translation between writing, drawing, and making.
The Mechanism was first published in 2013, limited to an edition of /13, by Arrow Bookworks. The monograph was dedicated to particular friends, creative collaborators, and supporters with most copies gifted with thanks to these people.
This second impression of The Mechanism was published in 2021, limited to an edition of /78, by Arrow Bookworks. This is the first instance that The Mechanism has been accessible to a wider audience. It is dedicated to the people who believe in peace and kindness during times of sea-change and who, together, hold the power for collective worldwide transformation.
The Mechanism (Arrow Bookworks, 2021)
Bookwork: 21.5cm, 21.5cm, 1.00cm.
27 pages (8 Poems, 8 Drawings).
Card, cloth, 170 gsm paper.
(ISBN 978-1-5272-8609-2)
Limited edition /78.
The Mechanism can now be found in special collections and cultural organisations in the UK and abroad including:
The Bodleian Library, Oxford University, UK / Cambridge University Library , Cambridge, UK / National Library of Wales, Aberystwyth, Wales / National Library of Scotland, Edinburgh, Scotland / The British Library, London, UK / amongst others and private collections. Thank-you to all.
To view further images of this work see: The Mechanism
