I Shivered Violently / Don’t be Startled in the Night

By way of gathers and gaps, leaps and snaps, this publication presents two networked essays that, between them, attempt to bring into view the poetics and possibilities of (dis)order, (il)legibility and (dis)orientation.

I Shivered Violently / Don’t Be Startled in the Night… approaches the renowned dynamic ordering and continual inventory of the Sitterwerk Foundation Kunstbibliothek (CH) as a site and a system of intrigue. In particular, these essays track the intent of a bespoke machine, fitted with an RFID scanner, that reads the shelves of the library at the end of the day. Visitors return items to the stacks at random and so, at night, an up-to-date record — and map — of the collection is created.

The behaviour of magnets, prompted by their role in the library’s technology used in the library, guides the attention of this publication, and is the subject of the written essay by Bryony Quinn. The visual essay, by Paul Bailey, which arranges material harvested from the Sitterwerk collection and beyond, deals with the conditions and manipulations of seeing with, and through, machines.