You are cordially invited to a book launch and exhibition
for a new artist’s book by Diane Jacobs:
OWED TO THE MOUNTAIN
Friday, November 12, 5:00-8:00 pm
with a brief artist’s talk at 7:00 pm
Saturday, November 13, 12:00-6:00 pm
Passages Bookshop
1223 NE ML King Blvd.
Portland, OR 97232
503-388-7665
Masks required for attendance
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Passages Bookshop is pleased to welcome folks back into the shop with an exhibition of prints and books by Diane Jacobs, all related to the exciting and ambitious new project that has kept her occupied for the last several years, Owed to The Mountain.
From the prospectus:
Stories are both history and prophecy — time is circular — stories are among our most potent tools
for restoring the land and our relationship to it. — Robin Kimmerer
Owed to The Mountain is a sculptural artist’s book — the box unfolds one leaf at a time, to reveal each of the four directions. The Mountain is featured in four different printmaking techniques: West face – etching; North face – wood engraving; East face – lithography; and South face – reduction woodcut. There are four linoleum cut river prints and three handset, letterpress stories from the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs.
The box opens flat; in the center a paper mountain peeks through a cloud layer held up by five tree trunks. Three handmade paper mountain skins nest inside one another: The outermost layer is made with celadonite pigment and accentuated with white ink, exposing words; the middle surface details the dwindling glaciers; and the innermost layer represents the volcanic strata. Beneath the mountain rests a fine-press book. Ink drawings of animals in various colorful ecosystems and habitats appear among the text, documenting the changing seasons. The stories weave multiple Native voices that underscore the value of friendship, reciprocity, interdependence, and cooperation.
Materials and printmaking techniques for the fine-press book include solar etching plates developed from Sumi ink animal drawings, a monoprint centerfold, book cloth printed with a silkscreen water motif, end sheets made by eco-printing of plants found on Mt. Hood, habitats created from pressure printing and reduction woodcuts, and stories handset in Weiss foundry type and printed letterpress.
Owed to The Mountain takes three forms:
- an eight-copy edition of the sculptural mountain with the fine-press book, housed in a folding box;
- the fine-press book alone, in an edition of 32 copies; and
- 250 signed and numbered handsewn copies digitally printed at Morel Ink in Portland
Owed to The Mountain cultivates a powerful story that inspires knowing a place deeply, sharing Indigenous wisdom, and building a community that turns its love for a mountain into action. Mt. Hood has the sixth largest carbon stores of all the National Forests in the country! By galvanizing a movement that advocates for the US Forest Service management plan to be updated, Mt. Hood can be celebrated and treated as a living ecosystem and increase its climate resilience. Through this project’s research, interviews, and by spending time on the mountain, I understand how important it is that we protect clean drinking water, promote wildlife habitat restoration, support forest maturation, and prioritize the vision and cultural traditions of Native communities, including the practice of controlled burns. We owe it to the Mountain.
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