ERASURE

2014

Materials: paper, bookcloth, the last words of inmates executed in Texas

ERASURE is an accordion-bound artist book housed in a clamshell box. The book’s text is final statements of thirty-four inmates who were executed in Texas.* These statements are printed on the back of the pages, so that if you turn the pages as you would read a typical book, the statements are hidden. What appears instead are small windows cut out of empty pages. Each window shows one word, and these words tell the fictional story of the family member of a homicide victim. The man convicted was sentenced to death, and the speaker is struggling with the execution.

*The statements are taken verbatim from the Texas Department of Justice Website. You can find these and all other final statements from those executed in Texas here.