The Idiot -
Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Ron Arad (designer)
2006 - Penguin Books, London - Limited edition number 9 of 1, 000 copies
A magnificent presentation of a Dostoyevsky masterpiece.
‘I chose The Idiot without even thinking about it. I didn't even have to choose it - it selected itself. I first read it when I was 16 or 17, and I've never read a book like it since. It was mind-blowing: the title, the expectations it creates in a 16-year-old boy, and then you meet this amazing character. He's nothing but an idiot. It is very bleak - but such is life.’ - Ron Arad.
Published on the occasion of Penguin Book's 60th Anniversary, ‘The Idiot’ is one of five classics that the publisher issued in a Limited Edition by commissioning five of the world's most important artists in their respective fields. ‘Unfortunately the novel I read came with a cover - a black and white portrait. You have a job getting rid of the image and having your own, un-influenced vision, and the reader resents this. This led to my first decision, which was not to have a cover image at all - just to say "The Idiot" and "Dostoyevsky" and go straight to the story, to get on the train immediately. Also, we tend to pick up a book and look at the back, so there's no back cover either. Let the book be its own cover.
When I had the meeting with Penguin I presumed we were talking about paperbacks, but I realised that what they had in mind was a luxurious hardback, and for every book to be presented in an acrylic slipcase. I thought, fine, but can I stick to the paperback?
The format of my book is different from everybody else's, but the acrylic case is the same. It's very difficult to avoid inventing things, so I made the case out of a Fresnel lens. It has concentric grooves, and the effect is like that of a big magnifying glass. Because the lens is tight to the cover, it distorts the book to a pyramid shape - at the front page of the book you can also see all four edges, creating something of a reverse perspective, with the last page a lot bigger than the front page. This gave me the opportunity to do graphics on the edges of the book. On the top page I wrote "The Idiot", handwritten white on black; on the long right-hand side I wrote "Dostoyevsky"; and on the bottom I did a hand-drawn version of the Penguin Classics logo. On the spine I exposed all the threads that bind the book together. When you lift the lid of the box, the book grows, and you can actually use the box as a magnifying glass to read the novel if you want to.
I'm very happy that despite introducing lots of tricks, if you like, to the design of the book, I stayed true to my original idea of having no front or back cover. When you have transparent layers on something, they interact with whatever that thing is - sometimes you can post-rationalise it, sometimes it is random and has its own beauty.
I design anything, from very small things to buildings. I'm not a graphic designer: graphics, for us, is the means, not the final product. Images are the first step in everything I do. I did do a drawing of how the book might look, what effect the lens might have, but I think I got better than I expected - not wanting, in this case, to improve something that is very difficult to improve upon. Paul Smith has dressed his book up - that's what he does. I've stripped mine.’ [The Guardian newspaper, 2006]
***
The other titles are F. Scott Fitzgerald’s ‘Tender is the Night’, Gustave Flaubert's ‘Madame Bovary’, D. H. Lawrence's ‘Lady Chatterley's Lover’, and Fyodor Dostoyevsky's ‘Crime And Punishment’ (he is the only novelist to be honoured with not one, but two, masterpieces in the Series).
***
“Ron Arad is an Israeli designer born in Tel Aviv in 1951. He studied at the Jerusalem Art Academy and at the Architectural Association in London.
His objects are the result of a constant experimentation of raw materials such as steel, aluminium or polyamide, which he distorts into sinusoidal, elliptical and oval forms. Alongside his studio work, Arad designs for many leading international companies including Kartell, Vitra, Moroso, Fiam, Driade, Alessi, Cappellini, Cassina, WMF and Magis amongst many others.
He was awarded the 2011 London Design Week Medal for design excellence and became an Academician of the Royal Academy of Arts in 2013. Ron Arad has designed a number of public art pieces such as the Vortex in Seoul, South Korea, and the Kesher Sculpture at the Tel Aviv University, Israel.
Arad’s work is held in public collections worldwide including The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, Musée d'Art Moderne and Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, Musée des Beaux-Arts de Montréal and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, among others. He has also designed various public artworks, some which can be seen in Tel Aviv, Seoul, Toronto and London. He has collaborated with brands such as Adidas, Samsung, Kenzo, Fiat, and many more. In 2013, Arad became an Academician of the Royal Academy of Arts.” [Opera Gallery]
References: Penguin Classics, web. Random House, web. Faber and Faber, web. Condition: Fein in fine perspex case Ref: 112704 Price: HK$ 5,000
‘I chose The Idiot without even thinking about it. I didn't even have to choose it - it selected itself. I first read it when I was 16 or 17, and I've never read a book like it since. It was mind-blowing: the title, the expectations it creates in a 16-year-old boy, and then you meet this amazing character. He's nothing but an idiot. It is very bleak - but such is life.’ - Ron Arad.
Published on the occasion of Penguin Book's 60th Anniversary, ‘The Idiot’ is one of five classics that the publisher issued in a Limited Edition by commissioning five of the world's most important artists in their respective fields. ‘Unfortunately the novel I read came with a cover - a black and white portrait. You have a job getting rid of the image and having your own, un-influenced vision, and the reader resents this. This led to my first decision, which was not to have a cover image at all - just to say "The Idiot" and "Dostoyevsky" and go straight to the story, to get on the train immediately. Also, we tend to pick up a book and look at the back, so there's no back cover either. Let the book be its own cover.
When I had the meeting with Penguin I presumed we were talking about paperbacks, but I realised that what they had in mind was a luxurious hardback, and for every book to be presented in an acrylic slipcase. I thought, fine, but can I stick to the paperback?
The format of my book is different from everybody else's, but the acrylic case is the same. It's very difficult to avoid inventing things, so I made the case out of a Fresnel lens. It has concentric grooves, and the effect is like that of a big magnifying glass. Because the lens is tight to the cover, it distorts the book to a pyramid shape - at the front page of the book you can also see all four edges, creating something of a reverse perspective, with the last page a lot bigger than the front page. This gave me the opportunity to do graphics on the edges of the book. On the top page I wrote "The Idiot", handwritten white on black; on the long right-hand side I wrote "Dostoyevsky"; and on the bottom I did a hand-drawn version of the Penguin Classics logo. On the spine I exposed all the threads that bind the book together. When you lift the lid of the box, the book grows, and you can actually use the box as a magnifying glass to read the novel if you want to.
I'm very happy that despite introducing lots of tricks, if you like, to the design of the book, I stayed true to my original idea of having no front or back cover. When you have transparent layers on something, they interact with whatever that thing is - sometimes you can post-rationalise it, sometimes it is random and has its own beauty.
I design anything, from very small things to buildings. I'm not a graphic designer: graphics, for us, is the means, not the final product. Images are the first step in everything I do. I did do a drawing of how the book might look, what effect the lens might have, but I think I got better than I expected - not wanting, in this case, to improve something that is very difficult to improve upon. Paul Smith has dressed his book up - that's what he does. I've stripped mine.’ [The Guardian newspaper, 2006]
***
The other titles are F. Scott Fitzgerald’s ‘Tender is the Night’, Gustave Flaubert's ‘Madame Bovary’, D. H. Lawrence's ‘Lady Chatterley's Lover’, and Fyodor Dostoyevsky's ‘Crime And Punishment’ (he is the only novelist to be honoured with not one, but two, masterpieces in the Series).
***
“Ron Arad is an Israeli designer born in Tel Aviv in 1951. He studied at the Jerusalem Art Academy and at the Architectural Association in London.
His objects are the result of a constant experimentation of raw materials such as steel, aluminium or polyamide, which he distorts into sinusoidal, elliptical and oval forms. Alongside his studio work, Arad designs for many leading international companies including Kartell, Vitra, Moroso, Fiam, Driade, Alessi, Cappellini, Cassina, WMF and Magis amongst many others.
He was awarded the 2011 London Design Week Medal for design excellence and became an Academician of the Royal Academy of Arts in 2013. Ron Arad has designed a number of public art pieces such as the Vortex in Seoul, South Korea, and the Kesher Sculpture at the Tel Aviv University, Israel.
Arad’s work is held in public collections worldwide including The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, Musée d'Art Moderne and Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, Musée des Beaux-Arts de Montréal and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, among others. He has also designed various public artworks, some which can be seen in Tel Aviv, Seoul, Toronto and London. He has collaborated with brands such as Adidas, Samsung, Kenzo, Fiat, and many more. In 2013, Arad became an Academician of the Royal Academy of Arts.” [Opera Gallery]
References: Penguin Classics, web. Random House, web. Faber and Faber, web. Condition: Fein in fine perspex case Ref: 112704 Price: HK$ 5,000