Fessler created the Alphabetical Index books for her Art History Lesson installation. She designed spine labels and had them fabricated then applied the labels to existing leather bound volumes. Two sets of books rested upright on shelves in the installation. The spines read Alphabetical Index – Descriptions of Rape Paintings from the History of Art. Some of the books from the Alphabetical Index seemed to me missing. As a result, the index letters on their spines spelled out NOBLE and NATURAL, two words used by H. W. Janson to describe Poussin’s Rape of the Sabine Women in his survey textbook History of Art.

Alphabetical Index, artist’s books by Ann Fessler, 1994
Set of 12 books, unique objects
Medium: altered books; applied spine labels