id est: neo scribalist asemic expressionism

id est: neo scribalist asemic expressionism is a hand painted (with gouache and watercolor pencils) abstract illuminated manuscript. It utilizes asemic writing to tell the story of my psychological journey and final arrival into Agnostic Pantheism; the book is about going through mental hell and emerging as a spiritual survivor. id est contains 73 art works painted with gouache and water color pencils on water color paper. This work was begun in 2021 and completed in 2023. The calligraphy in the book is rough and designed to be neo-expressive and true rather than technically perfect. The title id est means “that is” in Latin and is an homage to past and future scribes. I learned some Latin years ago to help me quit smoking cigarettes; every time I felt the urge to smoke, I would pull out my Latin dictionary and learn a few words till the craving subsided. Yet, there are no words in id est; instead, the book is filled with asemic calligraphy, mysterious figures, and abstract symbols. The book is meant to be read as a meditation even though most of the art is hectic, noisy, and urban. My intention was to take and modernize and revive the role of the scribe and demonstrates a new mode of contemporary free expression. The release of id est coincides with my 50th revolution around the Sun and is presented to the reader as a ticket to the universe and as a document of my spiritual quest.Works that influenced my creation process are The Book of Kells, Bestiaries, a Batak Pustaha, The Codex Seraphinianus, The Voynich Manuscript, The Rohonc Codex, Mayan and Aztec painted books, Kenneth Patchen's picture-poems, William Blake's mystical illuminations, Tom Phillips' A Humument, Timothy Ely's artist books, Visual poetry, and the wilder action scribes of the asemic movement. Three artists who influenced my book are: Cy Twombly, José Parlá, and Jean-Michel Basquiat.Bio:Michael Jacobson is a writer, artist, publisher, and independent curator from Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA/Turtle Island. His books include an abstract illuminated manuscript titled id est: neo scribalist asemic expressionism, a prose poetry novella Somnolent Game (Post-Asemic Press), his collected asemic writing Works & Interviews (Post-Asemic Press), his autobiographical collection of senryu poems Hei Kuu (Post-Asemic Press), and his EP of sound poetry Schizo Variations; he is also co-editor of An Anthology Of Asemic Handwriting (Punctum Books). Besides writing books, he curates a gallery for asemic writing called The New Post-Literate. He also sits on the editorial board of the online magazine SCRIPTjr.nl. Recently, he was published in The Last Vispo Anthology (Fantagraphics). In 2017, he curated the Minnesota Center for Book Arts exhibit: Asemic Writing: Offline & In The Gallery. Other countries where he has curated exhibits of asemic writing include Mexico, Spain, and Malta. His online interviews are at Poemeleon, SampleKanon, Asymptote Journal, Twenty Four Hours, David Alan Binder, GAS, Utsanga, and at Medium. In the past, he created the cover art for Rain Taxi’s 2014 winter issue. Back in 2017, he founded Post-Asemic Press, to publish asemic writing, visual poetry, experimental poetry, and audio recordings of sound poetry. In 2019, he was written up in the book Asemic: The Art of Writing (University of Minnesota Press) by Peter Schwenger; it has an entire chapter dedicated to Jacobson’s calligraphic work. He also founded and administers the asemic writing Facebook group. In his spare time, he curates a cyberspace gallery of planets dubbed THAT: A Plan(et). Read more