Introducing Heartsarnes
The story behind my new artist book
If you also receive my newsletter, you will already have seen the release of my new book. This is a longer piece with a bit of background information for those that don’t yet know about it.
For the past seven years I’ve been working on “Heartsarnes”, an artist book exploring grief, memory, and the supportive presence of nature.
Heartsarnes is an Old English word for grief. Its literal meaning is “soreness of the heart.”
Whilst caring for my terminally ill father I used to take myself out into the woodlands behind my parents’ house when everything got just a little bit too heavy. It gave me some respite and a space to breathe. I continued walking in those woodlands after he passed away, taking my camera with me and allowing nature and the physical act of photography to take me out of my grief.
A few years later, I attended a business workshop held by the Design Trust, where I sat next to Jo Scott, a fabulous artist who has since become a dear friend and my creative accountability partner (we have been meeting once a month on zoom ever since, her support and advice along the way, not only on this project but other areas of my photography, has been invaluable).
I mentioned the idea of a book thinking it would come together fairly quickly. In fact I nearly pressed go at the printers five years ago but at the very last minute something stopped me. I wasn’t entirely sure what it was but in my gut I knew it wasn’t right. In hindsight now I can see that it wasn’t ready, I wasn’t ready. There was still more grieving to come.
Last February I signed up for an online bookmaking course run by Caroline Fraser, another fine art photographer and book artist. I have produced two other books previously but felt I needed some regular momentum to continue with the book. The course did exactly that, plus teach me a different software program to design the book in, and allow me to dip a toe in the water and show the others in the group my work. The feedback encouraged me to move forward with it.
The last year has been about refining the words, choosing the photos, meeting with a printer, deciding on the best paper (the one I have chosen is just gorgeous), designing the cover and settling on the number for this first limited edition. It’s 40.
The book that now exists is a different one to the one I nearly published five years ago, different even to the one I thought was finished last year. I’m so proud of how it has all come together, how I didn’t rush into publishing it but took the time to make it the version it is now.
I know it’s not the done thing to blow your own trumpet, but oh my it is a beautiful thing.
The page isn’t currently public on my website so if you would like to see more/purchase a book or companion print you can go to https://www.sandrajordan.co.uk/heartsarnes-book
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Gosh thank you for those lovely words Sandra!
I still remember our first conversation about this back in 2019, I thought it sounded a wonderful project and I wanted to be around to see how it turned out.
It really is a book of beauty I was so excited to hold my copy, not surprised to be welling up before I got past the front cover and am spending a lot of time getting lost in your images, well done and thank you! X
This looks both rich in texture and colour, the layout is equally beautiful. Very nicely done! Congratulations on a fine result!!