Le palais des curieux, ou l'algébre et le sort donnet la décision des questiones les plus douteuses - by Marc de Vulson
Troyes: Chez la Cit. Garnier, published between 1728 - 1730
French-style fine binding with laced-in boards. Bound in prussian blue buffalo skin with back-pared onlays in handmade papers in natural, black, magenta, mauve, granite and periwinkle. Onlays are embellished with beads and embroidery in cotton floss. Tooling in metallic copper. Leather wrapped endbands in metallic fuchsia. Text sewn on stubs of steel grey paper. Island paste down in steel grey paper embellished with matte grey tooling and dark grey embroidery cotton floss. Handmade paper fly leaves and endpapers in purple, orange and pink.
Book is housed in a clamshell box covered in prussian blue buffalo skin and steel grey paper. Leather spine embellished with paper onlays and embroidery cotton floss. Trays covered in orange and pink handmade paper and lined with fuchsia Silsuede. Cushion includes cotton batting.
18cm x 13.6cm x 2cm – Completed in 2023
Artist Statement
The text-based design reads like an advertisement for a seer.
Palais des curieux is an 18th century guide to dreams, designed to decipher the mysteries behind the imagery we conjure as we sleep or perhaps to remind us that des songes sont mensonges (dreams are lies). The spine of the clamshell box is decorated with some of those iconic symbols we dream about.
However, if your goal is to find your fortune outside of dreams, then navigate your way through the interactive grid of circles to find the answer to your burning questions.