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Whether in the form of drawing, photography, or large-scale installation, Sadie Barnette’s work revels in the abstraction of city space and the transcendence of the mundane to the imaginative. She creates visual compositions that engage a hybrid aesthetic of minimalism and density, using text, glitter, family Polaroids, subculture codes, and found objects. Recent works engage as primary source material the 500-page FBI surveillance file kept on her father, Rodney Barnette, who founded the Compton, California, chapter of the Black Panther Party in 1968. In the artist’s hands, these repressive documents are reclaimed — splashed with pink spray paint and adorned with crystals — in an intergenerational assertion of the power of the personal as political. Barnette’s work deals in the currency of the real, in earthly acts of celebration and resistance, but is also tethered to the otherworldly, to a speculative fiction, to galactic escape. As the artist says, “This is abstraction in service of everyday magic and survival in America.”

How To Vol. 3 continues the artist’s series of absurdist “How To” manuals which ask all the right questions, but leave the answers floating just beyond the images included, all taken from the artist’s daily life. Previous volumes have addressed topics such as “How to kill fruit flies,” “How to talk to cops,” and “How to lie on the floor.” How To (2012) and How To Vol. 2. (2015) were printed by the artist and bound using a sewing machine; Open Space is pleased to present the third volume.

It is prepared for double-sided 8.5” x 11” printing, such that you only need to choose the paper you’d like and hit print. It can be produced via a printer without double-sided capabilities by first printing all the odd pages (note that “page” here refers to a single page of the PDF, which will contain two pages of the book), then reinserting the paper so that the even pages are printed on the other side.

Once printed, stack the pages. Pages 16–17 of the book (i.e. page 16 of the PDF — the photo of a chain link fence) should be facing out on top; the front and back covers (i.e. page 1 of the PDF) should begin the stack, and all other pages should proceed sequentially. Once stacked, cut away the margins as instructed at the bottom of the pages (i.e. cut a quarter inch from the top/bottom and a third of an inch from the sides); please note that the image should be cut precisely along its borders — this is another simple way to gauge where the border should be cut on all the pages. After that, bind as you please — long-reach staplers are an efficient means of doing so, but other methods can be found here. After binding, fold in half and enjoy.

If you lack access to a printer or are otherwise unable to assemble the book, please contact openspace@sfmoma.org, and we’ll provide you with a sequenced/non-collated PDF for your reading convenience.

— SB/Eds.

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