aMAZEme Labyrinth Uses 250,000 Books to Replicate Author’s Fingerprint

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aMAZEme Labyrinth Uses 250,000 Books to Replicate Author’s Fingerprint

August 1, 2012

All images courtesy of Peter Macdiarmid/Getty Images

Brazilian artists Marcos Saboya and Gualter Pupo have sculpted a large-scale, literary-inspired project that unites performance, installation, image and cinema for the London 2012 Festival. The installation, called aMAZEme, was inspired by the particularly labyrinthine stories of acclaimed author Jorge Louis Borges. Working over the course of 4 days with the help of over 50 volunteers, the two artists were able to construct winding walls of books in the shape of Jorge Louis Borges’ own fingerprints. With over 250,000 books in the stacks, visitors can wander through the labyrinth while listening to an accompanying audio tour in complete immersion within the literary world. Continue.

aMAZEme: A Labyrinth Made from 250,000 Books from Christopher Jobson on Vimeo.

The piece is a colossal block of literature, covering 500 square meters and rising as high as 8 feet in some areas. Oxfam has loaned 150,000 books to populate the project, while the remaining 100,000 books were loaned from publishing houses around the UK. All of the books will be returned to Oxfam when aMAZEme ends its run in August, with the funds from the project being donated to help their work fighting poverty around the world. aMAZEme will be on display in the Southbank Centre Clore Ballroom until August 25, ending week 12 of the nationwide celebration.