ORACLE BONES AND SCHOLARS STONES
By David and Jill Sellars
An edition of 6 miniature books produced by David and Jill Sellars.
Illustrated with suminagashi images by Jill, words printed on old English hand made paper.
Text composed of words which resonate with the images.
The spines of the bindings are covered in grey Harmatan goatskin, titled in black with side panels of David’s salt paper.
The front boards inlaid with a disc of emulsified white leather dust, the back boards inlaid with vellum, design is by David.
Endpapers of oil marbled papers by Jill.
Presented in a clamshell box.
Jill has been exploring suminagashi for some years and having discovered its meditative qualities she related these works to the ancient Oriental traditions of ‘scholars’ stones. In China known as ‘gonshi’ and in Japan ‘suiseki’, these are naturally occurring rocks which are studied for their ‘suggestability’ - they suggest something to the viewer, but not as a precise miniature representation of the object.
‘Oracle bones’ are the earliest examples of Chinese writing, dating from c. 1200 bc,
so called because the writing deals with divination and is carved on bone.

No1 in the edition was donated to the Society of Bookbinders on the occasion of David and Jill’s 60th birthdays
which happened to coincide with the
Warwick conference, August 2009
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