Buzz Spector is an artist and critical writer whose artwork has been shown in such museums and galleries as the Art Institute of  Chicago, Los Angeles Count Museum of Art, Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., and the Mattress Factory, Pittsburgh, PA. Spector’s work makes frequent use of the book, both as subject and as object, and is concerned with relationships between public history, individual memeory and perception. He has issued a number of artists’ books and editions since the mid-1970’s, including, most recently, Time Square, a letterpress limited edition bookwork published by the Pyracantha Press at Arizona State University in Tempe earlier this year. Previous Spector Publications include Details; Closed to Open, an artists’ book of photographic details from images in the Swarthmore College Peace Collection, an archive of  historical and contemporary information related to peace and social justice, published in 2001 by the artist and Swarthmore College, and Beautiful Scenes; Selections from the Cranbrook Archives (Cranbrook Art Museum, Bloomfield Hills, MI, 1998).
Spector was a co-founder of WhiteWalls, a magazine of writings by artists, in Chicago in 1978, and served as the publications’ editor until 1987. since then he has written extensively on topics in contemporary art and culture, and has contributed reviews and essays to a number of publications, including American Craft, Artforum, Art Issues, Dialogue, Exposure, New Art Examiner and Visions. He is the author of The Book Maker’s Desire, critical essays on topics in contemporary art and artists’ books (Umbrella Editions, 1995), and numerous exhibition catalogue essays, including “Ann Hamilton: Sao Paulo” – Seattle (University of Washington Press, 1992), and “Dieter Roth” (University of Iowa Museum of Art. 1999).
Spector earned his B.A. in Art from Southern Illinois State University at Carbondale in 1972, and his M.F.A. with the Committee of Art and Design at the University of Chicago in 1978. His most recent recognition is a 2005 New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA) Fellowship. In 1991, he was awarded a Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Fellowship, and in 1982, 1985 and 1991, he received National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship Awards. He is professor and chair of the Department of Art at Cornell University.

Panel: Making Books: Text/Context
Topic: Pages (Book as Subject and Object)
(Friday morning)