“How do you know what happens to you isn’t good?”

So ends the spare and elegant short story by Amy Hempel, titled The Man in Bogotá. I first read this story as a teenager, and its final note left a deep impression on me. So when I got a phone call a few months ago from my father who asked to use 6 of my new collages to accompany this story in a limited-edition artist book he was making, I got goosebumps. Of course, I said yes. Now the book is complete. I am happy to share some photos of it here.

Here are some technical notes from the colophon:

“The Man in Bogotá has been made as a limited edition of forty copies in the summer and fall of 2015. The photo collages are by Mary Daniel Hobson and have been printed as high-resolution digital prints on Entrada 300 rag paper by Rhiannon Alpers at the San Francisco Art Institute. Rhiannon Alpers also printed the text in Adobe Garamond by letterpress on Coronado SST paper. The circular holes in the pages were laser cut at Magnolia Editions in Oakland and the covers and slipcases have been made at the studio of John DeMerritt, Emeryville, California. Charles Hobson designed the edition and painted the night sky for the covers and the insets with acrylic paint on Canson Mi-Tientes paper. Charles Hobson assembled and bound the edition with the assistance of Alice Shaw.”