9th Annual Altered Book Exhibition and Fundraiser Presented Saturday April 28, 2018
Judges Comments by Mary Austin 

Not at this address - This ephemeral accounting is compiled from misdirected mail, pictures, and stories that “illustrate the gap between resources and need for those living without an address”...health plan envelopes, envelopes for taxes, human services, envelopes from the municipalities of San Francisco, Contra Costa County, Alameda. There are envelopes for ambulance services, Fastrak, DMV, SF General, Patient advocacy liaison offices, banks. It is a dizzying display of a person’s life through envelopes, photos and even a clipper card, left behind - There is a naughty part of me that would like to rip open the envelopes... but maybe that it is the point - that you can’t. A collective portrait of homeless life created by the detritus that is left behind. The envelopes tell the story through slashing marker strokes “forwarded”, “not at this address”, “moved on”, “lost”, “missing”, “returned” and finally, “deceased”. There is a feeling of mail that is ever less able to reach people either physically or psychologically. And the irony of trying to reach people by a method when the people themselves are disappearing is notable. The artist has used the form of the book to, in their own words, “pull the viewer into a world previously unvisited and to introduce a greater understanding to worlds that lay beyond the comfort zone.”