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A Four-Part Performance Installation
Did you know that nearly 4,000 books have been banned in school districts throughout the United States since 2024? And that marginalized voices are suppressed by banning books that reflect diverse experiences? Would like to help raise awareness about book banning and motivate others to take action?
Conceived and created by Ohio-based book artist, Amanda Love, and NON:op sound artist, Christophe Preissing, Inventory of Lost Books is a series of four installations connected via a historical narrative about book suppression and a possible future. This participatory installation will take place from August 2026 through spring 2027.
Add Your Voice to the Installation
Record your voice reading the titles and bits of words from banned books between now and May 1st to be included in the August opening in Chicago. Neighborhood recording sessions will be posted HERE soon. You may also contact inventoryoflostbooks@gmail.com for more information, to schedule a recording time, or to find out how you can assist with the project.
Collaborators and Partners
Christophe Preissing, sound artist, conceptualization
Christophe is a sound composer, intermedia artist, producer, and creative instigator whose work engages the contradictions of liminality, memory and decay, preservation and loss, and the happy accident. He has produced shows and performed at venues including Steppenwolf Theater, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago Cultural Center, Springfield Museum of Art (OH), Morris Museum (NJ), and Columbia University (NY).
Amanda Love, book artist, conceptualization
Amanda is an interdisciplinary artist known for versatile paper-based art that ranges from intimate pieces to expansive installations. The ongoing censorship of ideas and books profoundly shapes her work. She engages with various media and techniques to express her thematic focus, recycling discarded books and creating objects that resonate with both personal conviction and collective loss.
Liviu Pasare, video artist
Liviu has a Chicago based practice creating works and visual experiences using new media and technology. He works as a video designer, cinematographer, editor, animator and has produced, directed and performed for live multimedia experiences. He has been affiliated with theaters and artists such as Collaboraction, Redmoon, Chicago Children’s Theater, Blue Man Group, and Luftwerk.
E’mon Lauren, performance artist
E’mon Lauren in Chicago’s first Youth Poet Laureate and the author of Commando (Haymarket Books, 2017). Her work has appeared in Poetry Magazine, Sixty Inches from Center, The BreakBeat Poets, Vol. 2: Black Girl Magic (Haymarket Books, 2019), and elsewhere. She currently serves as Director of Artistic Programming at the #LetUsBreathe Collective in Chicago.
Theatre Y, rooms 2-3 host
Theatre Y is a Chicago-based international incubator that creates connections between diverse artists seeking mutual growth through collaboration. Since 2006, Theatre Y has been a point of convergence for diverse activisms, and all of the uncomfortable conversations that happen as a result. Theatre Y serves to manifest imagined realities, living global citizenship to better understand our shared humanity.
Cleveland Public Library, rooms 4 host
Cleveland Public Library, rooms 4 hostThe Cleveland Public Library aims to foster a strong learning culture, motivating diverse residents to continuously acquire, share, and pursue knowledge for personal, community, and global benefit. Our vision for Cleveland and its library is a city in which opportunity is within reach and a Library that empowers its people. The Cleveland Public Library is The People’s University, the center of learning for a diverse and inclusive community.
