Book-Art
Anthologies
Alternative Publishing

Book-Art Bibliography (1984)

These titles satisfy three criteria: 1) They contain Kostelanetz’s creative work, as distinct from his expository writing; 2) They were designed (and often drawn, typeset and/or produced) by him; 3) They are as books unusual in form. Many titles initially issued by other publishers have since been retrieved and are available only from him as RK Editions.

Visual Language (Assembling Press, 1970). Initial collection of his visual poetry. 64 pp., 6 x 9, saddle-stitched, also signed & numbered one of 150 copies.

In the Beginning (Abyss, 1971), a visual novella based on the alphabet. 64pp., 5 x 8, perfect bound.

Ad Infinitum: A Fiction (International Artists Cooperation, n.d.), a second alphabetical novella. 16pp., 3 x 4 1/4.

Accounting (PN Books, 1973), the initial numerical book, in its revised edition. 14pp., 4 1/4 x 5 1/2, saddle-stitched.

Obliterate (Ironwhosebook, 1974), a dissected fiction distributed over sixteen sheets. 2 3/4 x 2, in a folded case.

I Articulations/Short Fictions (Kulchur Foundation, 1974), initial collection of short fictions bound back to back with a second collection of visual poems, both preceded by prefatory “After Sentences” that were erroneously interchanged. 64 pp. + 64 pp., 7 x 10, perfectbound, also hardback, some signed & lettered.

Recyclings (Assembling Press, 1974). Initial volume of a comprehensive nonsyntactic literary autobiography, this section recapitulating only 1959-67. 64 pp., 5 x 8, saddle-stitched, also signed & lettered with red covers.

Openings & Closings (1975), over three hundred one-sentence fictions—alternately either the openings of hypothetical fictions or the closings. 96pp., 7 x 10, perfectbound, signed & lettered, A-Z. Audiocassette edition (1975), 60 minutes, of the author reading parts of the text in inventively amplified stereo. A color videotape edition (1975), likewise 60 minutes.

Extrapolate (1975), an accordion of constructivist fiction, readable in either direction. 24 pp., 33/4 x 90, also signed & numbered, 1-12.

Come Here (Assembling/Cookie, 1975), an erotic visual fiction that the U.S. copyright office refused to certify on the grounds that it “lacks copyrightable artistic expression.” 20pp., 5 x 7, saddle-stitched, signed & lettered also.

Modulations (Assembling, 1975), another constructivist novella in the form of an accordion book that can likewise be read in either direction. 28pp., 3 x 84, on card stock, also signed & lettered.

Portraits from Memory (Ardis, 1975), a book-length visual poem of handwritten portraits of past loves. Hardbound, also paper, also signed & numbered to 10.

Constructs (WCPR, 1976), the initial collection of symmetrical line-drawings in systemic sequences. 112pp., 8 1/4 x 8, also signed & lettered, with special black covers.

Rain Rains Rain (Assembling, 1976), a long visual poem whose twenty-three images can be read in any order, or mounted on a wall. Twenty-four unbound cards, 5 x 8, also individually signed & lettered.

Numbers: Poems & Stories (Assembling, 1976), the initial gathering of numerical work. 24pp., 11 1/2 x 16, folded newsprint, also signed & lettered.

Prunings/Accruings (Ecart, 1977), nonsyntactic Biblical prose that can be read from front to back, or back to front. 24pp., 5 3/4 x 8 1/4, saddle-stitched, also signed & lettered.

Illuminations (Future/Laughing Bear, 1977), a third collection of visual poems. 48pp., 5 1/2 x 8, saddle-stitched, also signed & lettered, with special red covers.

Numbers Two (Luna Bisonte/Future, 1977), visually organized numerical images. Seven cards, 8 1/2 x 11, in an envelope, individually signed & lettered, A-Z.

One Night Stood (Future, 1977), a minimal fiction with no more than two words to a paragraph, published in two radically different formats. “I wanted to see whether the experience of reading the exact same words could be made radically different.” 176pp., 5 1/4 x 4, perfectbound, also clothbound, clothbound signed & lettered. And 24pp., loose newsprint, 11 x 17, also signed & lettered.

Constructs Two (Membrane, 1978), second collection of symmetrical line-drawings in systemic sequences. 80pp., 4 1/4 x 5 1/2, also signed & lettered copies are available from the author.

Tabula Rasa (1978), a constructivist novel, approx. 1,000 pages, 8 x 8. Only twelve copies were signed and numbered by the author.

Inexistences (1978), constructivist stories, approx. 666 pp., 4 x 4. Only twenty-six copies were signed & lettered by the author.

On Holography (1978), initial hologram of five syntactically circular, grammatically seamless statements about holography. 91/2 x 14 (diameter), on a revolving stand.

Foreshortenings & Other Stories (Tuumba, 1978), which rearranges eighty-four module-sentences in systematically different ways. 28pp. Stereocassette (1977), with two completely different readings of the text, 60 minutes.

Exhaustive Parallel Intervals (Future, 1979), a book-length narrative, perhaps a novel, whose entire content is a diamond-shaped array of numbers whose positions change in systemic sequence, with an afterword by the author. 160pp., 6 x 9, perfectbound, also hardback, also signed & lettered by the author.

And So Forth (Future, 1979), over one hundred drawings of related geometric shapes that form modular narratives from page to page, published as loose sheets gathered into an envelope, with a preface by the author. 9 x 12. Ten complete sets were individually initialed and numbered by the artist.

More Short Fictions (Assembling, 1980), the most advanced collection of experimental stories, both verbal and visual, ever published in the United States—the harvest of the previous decade, with an afterword by the author. 224pp., 6 x 9, paper, also hardback, also signed & lettered.

Autobiographies (Future, 1981), a history of a life composed not as a continuous narrative but as an audacious multi-perspective collection of bits, written both recently and long ago (and at times by others). 284pp., 6 x 9, perfectbound, also clothbound, also signed & lettered.

Reincarnations (Future, 1981), a fiction composed entirely of recomposed photographs of the author in various incarnations, with a brief afterword. 64pp., saddle-stitched, 5 x 7.

Epiphanies (Literarisches Colloquium Berlin, 1983), the first gathering of his single-sentence stories that have been appearing in periodicals since 1979, translated collectively into German in an unusual way and imaginatively typeset. 48pp., 4 1/4 x 5 3/4. A video copy of a 20-minute film for German television.

Arenas/Fields/Pitches/Turfs (BkMk-University of Missouri at Kansas City, 1983), the principal collection of poems composed in geometric arrays of four, eight, and sixteen words, 71 pp., $10.00; 30’ stereo audiocassette, processed at the Electronic Music Studio of Stockholm (1987), $10.00; 3/4” U-Matic 30’ cassette composed at the Experimental TV Center, $125.00; VHS hifi stereo $60.00.

Recyclings (Future, 1984), an extension and updating of the first volume, published a decade before, of this nonsyntactic literary autobiography. 320pp., 5 x 7, perfectbound, also hardbound, also signed and lettered.

ALSO RELEVANT: Wordsand (1978), a catalogue of art-autobiographical essays, manifestoes and explanations, about art with words, numbers and lines, in several media, along with complete documentation, which was initially published to accompany an early retrospective exhibition, saddle-stitched, 92pp.

Audio Writing (1984), an introductory, comprehensive lecture-demonstration of his “publishing” with audiotape, with examples from over a dozen works. 91 minutes, stereocassette. (Audio Art [1978] is an earlier self-retrospective. 45 minutes, stereocassette.)

ADDENDA (2006)

Aftertexts/Prose Pieces (Atticus, 1987), two short collections of radically experimental prose, bound back to back, approx. 128 pages.

Collected Performance Texts (1991), typescripts with works both previously performed and unperformed, velobound, 145 pp., 8 1/2” x 11”.

Constructs Five (1991), with twenty-nine narratives, individually titled, one of ten signed and numbered, velobound, 167 pp., 8 1/2” x 11”.

Constructs Four: Stories (1991), with twenty sequences, identified only by roman numerals preceded by the generic identification of “CF,” dedicated to Sol LeWitt, whose early forays into book-making inspired this line of work, velobound, 176 pp., 8 1/2” x 11”.

Constructs Six: Stories (1991), also with twenty-nine narratives, individually titled, velobound, 180 pp., 8 1/2” x 11”.

Constructs Three: Stories (1991), twenty-five discrete narratives, individually titled, velobound, 186 pp., 8 1/2” x 11”.

Fifty Untitled Constructivist Fictions (1991), spiral-bound, with sequences made further abstract through the elimination of individual titles for stories that have distinct beginnings and ends, 290 pp., 8 1/2” x 11”.

Flipping (1991), probably the most daunting book in this later series of Constructivist Fictions, containing only three images whose appearance in the sequence is mixed in various ways, velobound, 150 pp., 8 1/2” x 11”.

Minimal Fictions (1994), one-, two-, and three-words stories, along with the “More of Less,” a cycle of 127 single-sentence erotic fictions, 96 pp., 5 1/2” x 8 1/2”.

Ecce Kosti (1996), a collection of encomia, 160 pp., 6” x 9”.

3-Element Stories (1998), each page containing three words that in any order suggest narratives, 112 pp., 5 1/2 x 8 1/2.

Vocal Shorts: Collected Performance Texts (1998), several texts meant for live presentation, each imaginatively designed by Martin Zotta, 8 1/2 x 11, 192 pp.

Two-Element Stories (2003), 24 pp., designed by Aryeh Cohen-Wade, with only two words and a full-stop (aka “a period”) to each page, $10.00.

Autobiographies at 60 (2004) & Autobiographies at 50 (2006), sequels likewise composed as a multi-perspective collection of bits, 8 1/2” x 11”.