Inspired by Homer’s Odyssey, a founding text of Western culture, the previously unpublished narrative-poem by Michaël Glück, illuminated by the original works of Bernard Alligand, transports us into an immersive, luminous, and spellbinding web.The artworks traverse the entire book, inviting us to follow Penelope’s narrative hand through the illusion of weaving, echoing the poet’s text. The choice of materials (varied paper textures and engravings), resin, powders of gold and silver, the tumult of marine effects (blue/sea), the succession of bands (weaving), the suggestive figuration (Penelope’s gesture) and the symbolic rendering of figures (gold/the gods), all create a singular intensity within the work-as-book.

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…/ Pénélope a posé sur la table / les fruits et l’absence / les olives qui ont mûri / sur un pied du lit / dans la chambre interdite / elle sait le récit / avant / l’invention des cartes / le fil jamais ne casse / entre ses doigts / fil de chaîne fil de trame / fil de vie fil des Parques​/ ...

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Original 2023 edition.
Penelope: The Narrative Hand represents nearly 9,000 manual interventions by the artist (excluding trials), across three supports:
(1) blue offset-printed paper painted with white acrylic;
(2) metallised paper; photographic elements printed digitally onto the painted surface; resin colouring, coating, and inlaying of silver and gold powders; measuring, cutting, composing, assembling, and mounting of bands;
(3) impressions on Moulin du Gué paper using the carborundum technique: composition on plate, application of material, dry press printing strip by strip.

 

Limited edition of 30 numbered copies + 1 hors commerce, signed in the colophon by the author and the artist:

– including 18 deluxe copies (nos. 1–18), comprising the book (text and illuminations throughout) and a leporello (visual works unfolding across 7 panels). The two leporellos are mounted facing each other within a chemise lined with midnight-blue velvet, tooled in gold on the spine, and housed in a matching slipcase.

– and 12 copies (nos. 19–30) of the book alone (text and illuminations throughout), housed in a midnight-blue cloth slipcase.

 

Two quarto leporellos (folded 20 × 29.7 cm), including the book (8 leaves for the text, 4 leaves for the suite).

The text, set in Baskerville type (roman and italic, sizes 11, 12, 14, 16, 18, 22), printed on Moulin du Gué white 270 gsm paper, was completed on the typographic presses of the Atelier d’Art des Montquartiers in Issy-les-Moulineaux in Spring 2023.

Chemise and slipcase produced by the Reliure du Centre workshop, Limoges.

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​PUBLIC PRICE (incl. VAT) 2026

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Book alone: €1,000
Deluxe copy: €2,200

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