"Parallax" by Karen Chance
This book shows a day in the experience of two men, who are strangers, but observant of one another. We see in the images, and read in the small excerpts of text, what they are experiencing though their own separate perspectives. In many ways, it shows the journey that the two men take on the subway very similarly to the way a traditional novel would, but like in Passage, the text is supplementary to the image. The images, rather than the text, are telling the story, by giving us the most insight into the headspace of the characters, as well as their location and surroundings. We can both physically see their reactions, while at the same time, the one line of text per page is letting us into their thoughts.
The journey described by this story is more psychological than temporal or geographical, as the two men, one straight and one homosexual, work through their opinions of each other based on their opposing views of homosexuality.
The author uses an accordion style book form, which also contributes much to our understanding of the two men’s journeys. The reader is able to flip through the pages just as they would a codex, but are also given the opportunity to expand the entire form and examine the journey continuously, rather than staggered page by page. Additionally, each man’s journey is given an opposite side of the page. This form also gives the unique opportunity to understand the two distinct experiences of the men as separate and opposite, which would have not been possible this way in a standard codex. In a novel, perhaps the author would have alternated chapters, switching from one perspective to the other. But this is still stuck in the notion of linearity, one man's story after the other. With the accordion form, we see the two perspectives as polar, but simultaneous. However, there are cutouts on some of the pages, allowing the readers a window into the other character's space. In the end, the two men's journeys meet in the same place on the last page; they must sit next to one another on the subway.
So in many ways, Parallax uses many ideas associated with the standard codex story, but is given many more opportunities for expression by using imagery and form. The journey on the subway is perceived linearly, reading left to right, from beginning to end, as in a codex. Pages can be flipped, or as permitted by the accordion style form, stretched out and read continuously. But we are also able to understand the opposing perspectives in a way that a codex novel cannot provide.
Now I want to turn to a distinct realm of artist book where the artist contributes no original media or text. The only creativity that can be attributed to the artist is where he or she finds her media, and how he or she displays it for viewers. We will turn to Andrea Botto’s book 19.06_26.08.1945 and examine the way he uses images to describe a geographical journey.
