Out of the Dark/Into the Water by Hannah Batsel

Hannah Batsel: "Out of the Dark/Into the Water is an edition of 125 hand-printed and hand-bound artist's books about the life and work of Oliver Robert Batsel, an American collector of exotic artifacts and art objects from around the world. Batsel spent his life gathering clothing, documents, jewelry, photographs, and other ephemera related to the Empyreal Trading Company (E.T.C.), a small mercantile enterprise which operated from the 17th through the 19thcenturies. Batsel's obsession was undeterred by the constant loss and calamity that accompanied it until one final disaster ended his life and collection in an instant.

"In 2004, after decades of amassing the most complete E.T.C. collection in the world, Hurricane Ivan leveled Batsel's beachside Florida home. The house, the collection, and Batsel himself were swept out to sea. Now, over a decade later, Batsel's granddaughter, Hannah, has begun to excavate the sand lot where the house once stood, recovering pieces of Batsel's story and restoring the artifacts to which he dedicated his life.

"Out of the Dark/Into the Water is a dos-a-dos book, a historical binding in which two text blocks share a back cover. One half describes Hannah Batsel's memories of and relationship with her often-absent but endlessly fascinating grandfather. The other half takes a closer look at the collection itself and the progress that has been made towards restoring it. Together, they form a story part imagined and part remembered, but in the end, essentially true. "