Description
You can still secure a discounted copy of Nothing remained unchanged but the clouds, to celebrate its upcoming German exhibition launch – an artist book by Alan J. Ward that unfolds as a contemplative visual and material journey.
What started with a single identifiable German photographic negative and First World War postcards, transformed into a sustained exploration of ‘place’ with Grandpré in the French Ardennes at its core. From these modest beginnings, the project evolved into a carefully structured narrative, where images, texts, and surfaces are layered deliberately. The book does not follow a linear storyline; instead, it invites a contemplative experience through fragments, subtle traces, and pauses. By highlighting the extraordinary within the ordinary, the work creates a rhythm of reflection, encouraging the reader to uncover the layers of time and meaning embedded in the landscape.
Central to the work is the interplay between image and text, where postcard reproductions, transcriptions and visual interventions are interwoven across the pages. Tip-ins and inserted elements interrupt the reading flow, creating moments of encounter and reflection. The rhythm of the book is shaped through these shifts – between opacity and clarity, surface and depth, presence and absence.
Through an interdisciplinary practice spanning visual art, cultural heritage and archaeology, Ward reclaims the postcard as both artefact and medium. The book becomes a space in which private messages and historical traces are reconfigured, opening new ways of seeing and engaging with the past.
Conceived as both object and sequence, Nothing remained unchanged but the clouds is not only read but handled, unfolded and revisited – an artist book that moves between archive and artwork, inviting sustained attention to the material and temporal layers it holds.
The publication comprises of 228 pages, in a hand-stamped softcover with dust jacket, including full-colour reproductions, tip-in pages and a pack of four unique postcard artworks. Texts by Alan J. Ward, Dr Corinne Painter (Leeds), and Lara-Marie Hägerling (Braunschweig). Published in English, French and German.
Format: 210 × 190 mm (portrait).
