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# The Book Object as Exhibition, an Interview with Dayanita Singh
- URL: https://hyperallergic.com/the-book-object-as-exhibition-an-interview-with-dayanita-singh/
- Published: 2018-11-01T17:36:01.000Z
- Updated: 2026-05-12T19:48:36.000Z
- Description: We talk to Singh her discontent with photography that simply exist on the walls of art galleries and museums, and why she prefers to create objects that she conceives as mini-exhibition.
- Author: Hrag Vartanian
- Tags: Podcast, Callicoon Fine Arts, #wp, #wp-post, #image-position-hidden, #Import 2025-11-18 14:37 (2018)

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2018/11/dayanita-singh-callicoon-1460.jpg)

Views of Dayanita Singh’s “book object” mini-retrospective at Callicoon Fine Arts (all photos by the author for Hyperallergic)

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2018/11/life-as-a-museum-dayanita-singh-1000.jpg)

One of the embroidered coats in the gallery

Artist [Dayanita Singh wasn’t happy taking photographs](https://simplecast.com/s/91ee38dc?ref=hyperallergic.com) in the traditional way, preferring to create what she calls “book objects,” mini-exhibitions to showcase her work. Singh plays with the conventional language of art, and even calls herself an “off-set artist” to denote her preferred way to display her images.

She is currently exhibiting in the Carnegie International exhibition in Pittsburgh, and she has a small retrospective of her book objects at [Callicoon Fine Art](http://www.callicoonfinearts.com/?ref=hyperallergic.com) on Manhattan’s Lower East Side. I talked to her about her love of images, a formative (and funny) experience she shared with Robert Frank, and the future of the artist book.

A special thanks to Flash Trading ([flashtrading.bandcamp.com](https://flashtrading.bandcamp.com/?ref=hyperallergic.com)) for providing the music for this episode.

This and more in the [current episode](https://simplecast.com/s/91ee38dc?ref=hyperallergic.com) of our weekly [Art Movements](https://hyperallergic.com/tag/art-movements-podcast/) podcast.