Josh Hockensmith
Josh Hockensmith is a book artist who produces handmade bookworks under the name Blue Bluer Books. His artists' book titles include Pandora's Book, Heart Sutra Remix, and Googled English Frontier Star. He has also produced small editions in collaboration with other North Carolina artists -- poet Jeffery Beam and artist Ippy Patterson. Always a bookworm, Josh first became interested in book structures when a friend gave him a Japanese stab-bound journal as a gift. Seeing the exposed sewing of the journal was a revelation that books are sophisticated little machines, and he's been playing with them ever since. He is also a poet, writer and translator whose work has appeared in South by Southeast, Oyster Boy Review, Versal, and other journals. Josh grew up in Hanover, Pennsylvania, the potato chip capital of the world. After earning his B.A. in English at the University of Richmond, he made his way further south to UNC-Chapel Hill to work in the preservation department of the University Library. There he met his wife, who had meandered northward from Florida just in time for them to meet halfway. While not native North Carolinians, they have found a little patch of woodland paradise in north Chatham County. Josh is currently the art library assistant at the Joseph C. Sloane Art Library.
