12th January 2026:
Our new display at ECA Library, Evolution House, features bookworks by Barbara A. Morton of Entropie Books.
The discipline of the blue-ochre envelope explores poetry, book-making, drawing and design. The bookwork is accompanied by hand-made ceramic pieces, some with text imprinted, emphasising the importance of the haptic, and exploring a new site for poetry to reside.
The display continues at Evolution House, West Port, until Friday 6 March 2026.
If you are interested in artists’ books and zines be sure to visit the annual Fruitmarket Bookmarket, on this year February 14th and 15th, at Fruitmarket Gallery, Edinburgh, 1 minute from Waverley Station!
This is always a fantastic fair and a great opportunity to talk with book makers and artists.
Coming up in March, Wednesday 4th, will be the 10th annual ECA Bookmarks Bookfair at ECA Sculpture Court, another fantastic opportunity to buy artists’ books, zines and prints from ECA students and artists from further afield.
A view of the Sculpture Court during Bookmarks 2024
Asemic writing, an intriguing form of expression devoid of specific semantic content, offers a universal language that transcends linguistic barriers. Emerging in the late 20th century, it has captivated artists seeking to explore the boundaries between text and visual art. Asemic writing’s abstract, calligraphic strokes evoke the appearance of writing without conveying explicit meaning, inviting viewers to engage with the work in a purely intuitive and emotional manner. Artists like Tim Gaze and Mirtha Dermisache have pioneered this genre, using its open-ended nature to provoke imagination and personal interpretation. This form challenges the traditional purposes of writing, emphasizing aesthetic experience over literal comprehension.
In contrast, pansemic writing encompasses the notion of universal meaning, striving to convey concepts that resonate across languages and cultures. This approach often employs symbols and signs understood globally, emphasizing shared human experiences. Artists utilizing pansemic writing aim to create connections through universally recognizable elements, bridging gaps that language may otherwise leave. Both asemic and pansemic writings disrupt conventional communication, encouraging a fresh dialogue about how we perceive and interpret written forms. As these art forms continue to evolve, they underscore the rich potential for writing to engage on a visual and emotive level, transcending the confines of traditional reading and inviting a more inclusive, imaginative interaction.
Books in this display, from our lending collection:
Reading Mirtha Dermisache, Regine Ehleiter, Textem Verlag, 2025:
Beginning in the late 1960s, the Argentinian conceptual artist Mirtha Dermisache (1940–2012) produced publications that consist of asemic writing: marks that resemble language but lack semantic content. Her artist’s books, letters and postcards challenge habitual responses to both art and literature, leading us to re-evaluate how language works, how we perceive it, and how it might be distinguished from drawing.
Mirtha Dermisache: Selected Writings, Ugly Duckling Presse, 2017
Mirtha Dermisache wrote dozens of books, hundreds of letters and postcards, and countless texts. Not a single one was legible, yet, in their promixity to language, they all resonate with a mysterious potential for meaning. Using ink on paper, Dermisache invented an array of graphic languages, each with their own unique lexical and syntactic structure.
Fluency: A Collection of Asemic Writing, Karla Van Vliet, Shanti Arts Publishing, 2021
In Fluency, we see a union of Karla Van Vliet’s lifelong practices of art and poetry, each dissolving into the other and resurfacing as asemic writing. In her words: “There are times when I do not have words. Yet I have the need and desire to write. It is to asemic writing that I turn in these moments. To the gesture of writing… In the branching tree limbs, in the waves, in my hand’s scratching across paper, we each read the feeling that rises in us.”
Asemic: The Art of Writing, Peter Schwenger, University of Minnesota, 2019
Codex Seraphinianus, Luigi Serafini, Rizzoli, 2013
An illustrated encyclopedia of an imaginary world, created by Luigi Serafini, and first published in 1981, using an invented asemic language to convey the way children look at books before they can understand the printed word.
Mountains and Triangles, Michael Dean, Forma Arts and Media, 2006
In this bookwork, Michael Dean uses the barest language and starkly minimal typography to create an almost physical linguistic space that becomes charged with an unexpected emotional impact.
The last vispo anthology: visual poetry 1988-2008, Crag Hill & Nico Vassilakis, Fantagraphics, 2012
Spotlights the intersection of art and language gathering the work of visual poets from around the world.
After words: visual and experimental poetry in little magazines and small presses, 1960-2025, Steven Clay and MC Kinniburgh, Granary Books, 2025
Artists’ Books:
Asemic sibyls, Marco Giovenale, C’est mon Dada series, number 80, Redfoxpress, 2013
Now leaves, Michael Dean, Bookworks, 2015
Little black book, Jenny Smith, Edinburgh, 2009
Untitled, Jenny Smith, Edinburgh, 2011
The display opens on 1st December 2025 and continues to 11th January 2026 at ECA Library, Evolution House.
Discover Box of Broadcasts: Your TV and radio library, totally free with your institutional login!
Access over 4 million programmes from BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and more, with no need for a TV licence. Stream documentaries, news, films, and drama series anytime, anywhere.
Log in now → learningonscreen.ac.uk/bob. You can also find BoB on DiscoverEd, and on our databases lists.
We all know that DIY zines are a brilliant way for communities to share knowledge and information. Here at ECA at the UoE we are very fortunate to have access to many online databases of primary source archive material, including zines. One such example is Power to the People: Counterculture, Social Movements, and the Alternative Press.
Power to the People showcases a range of ideas, initiatives, and social movements devoted to people-powered politics and organizing from the nineteenth to the twenty-first centuries. Ranging beyond a few specific movements, the archive paints a broad picture of the counterculture and many disparate organizations that represent this moment in modern Western history. Although the archive concentrates mainly on the United States and the United Kingdom, it also covers events and topics from around the globe.
The primary sources in Power to the People presents social history that highlights equity, diversity, and inclusion. The materials document issues of social justice and how attitudes about civil rights, gender equality, the environment, the government, and many of society’s institutions shifted dramatically to include citizen involvement, public welfare, and the planet’s health in the twentieth century. The archive presents a social history that highlights equity, diversity, and inclusion in materials created by the last generations that depended on primarily print communication, offering a unique reflection of the time before the growth of the internet and social media.
Alternative press publications throughout the archive represent anti-establishment and countercultural ideas and movements through art, satire, humour, and alternative lifestyles. Although these are often overlooked as vehicles for providing perspectives on social movements and countercultural ideas, they can have just as great an impact as mainstream social movements. The alternative press titles in Power to the People are unique, examining social issues, politics and government, sexuality, diversity, and more.
You can access Power to the People: Counterculture, Social Movements, and the Alternative Press via DiscoverEd, or through the primary source databases listed here.
We have a subject guide to zines and artists’ books at ECA Library, here.
The IAD are taking part in ‘WriteFest’ – an annual event established to support academic writing, running throughout November. During WriteFest the IAD will be running Writing Retreats to provide researchers with a quiet space and time to write, along with a selection of writing workshops and resources to support academic writing.
Find out more here
ECA Library holds various special collections and one of those is the Stone Archive. This dates from an Arts and Humanities Research Council-funded project led by Professor Jake Harvey from 2007 to 2011, and the resulting research archive is held in the ECA Library at Evolution House, West Port.
Items from the archive on permanent display are a case of stone cutting tools and instruments (on level 0 of the library) and a display table of stone samples, on level 1 of the library. There is also a collection of images gathered from travels around the world, sound recordings and stone-related publications which have been catalogued, the 2 volume printed catalogue can be consulted at the ECA Library Helpdesk.
A book was published after the completion of the project, “Stone: a legacy and inspiration for art“, and is held in the ECA Library lending collection on level 0.
For more information about the origins of the Stone Archive, click here.
The Art & Architecture Library at Minto House, Chambers Street, will close for the winter teaching vacation from 5.00pm on Friday 19th December, until 9.00am on Monday 12th January 2026. A fetch service for urgent requests will be in place for accessing the A&A Library book collection during the period 5th – 9th January; details have been published on the Art and Architecture Library webpage.
The ECA Library at Evolution House, West Port, will close for the winter teaching vacation at 5.00pm on Tuesday 23rd December, until 9.00am on Monday 5th January 2026.
The Main Library at George Square will be closed on 25th and 26th December, and also closed on 1st and 2nd January 2026. For full details of when the Main Library and its Helpdesk will be open over the Winter vacation check here.
Pidgeon Digital archive trial now available from the University of Edinburgh Library!
Listen to the greatest minds in modern architecture. Access hundreds of illustrated talks and interviews with major twentieth century architects within this online audio-visual collection. Founded by Monica Pidgeon, editor of influential radical magazine Architectural Design. Fully searchable illustrated talks and transcripts. Notable speakers include 17 Pritzker Prize winners and 15 RIBA Royal Gold Medal winners, including Zaha Hadid, Ted Happold, Serge Chermayeff, Richard Rogers, Cedric Price, Norman Foster and Felix Candela, to name but a few.
Free 60 day trial access using this link to our current library e-resources trials.
Do you LOVE FILM? Would you like to be able to watch the best in UK and international film, curated by experts? Then the BFI Player is for you!
All students and staff of the University of Edinburgh (including ECA!) can register for free access to the BFI Player subscription, thanks to the University of Edinburgh Library.
To access this fantastic resource, follow the guidance here.
BFI Player is included in our library catalogue DiscoverEd and on our list of film databases. Enjoy!
