In May of this year, a performance called Testing the Text took place on UpStage, as part of a larger project Making books with things, making things with books, led by Xelís de Toros and Ed Briggs with support from the English Arts Council. As well as their UpStage performance, the project included numerous other live events, a residency at the Community Arts Centre in Brighton, visits to printers and book binders, collaborations with artists from other disciplines and more.

The project has culminated in the production of an ebook, Makind books with things, making things with books, which collects documentation of the project as well as all kinds of texts and discussions. As stated in the introduction, the project aimed to “transcend the debates around the future of the book and the opposition between physical and digital books; instead we used this as a starting point to create an multi-layered project that explores the culture of the book and shift the focus to reading, writing and craftmanship.”

For anyone interested in books, text, and the potential for writing and reading in the digital age, the ebook will be an interesting resource.