Artist Carves Landscapes Into Books

"Historia das americas" by Guy Laramee

Now this is what I call recycling. Artist Guy Laramee uses old, outdated books (like obsolete editions of Encyclopedia Britannica) as his medium, carving and sand-blasting jaw-dropping landscapes into them.

Are paper books going the way of the Dodo? It’s a question that’s plagued the publishing industry for years, now that ereaders like Amazon’s Kindle have become more and more commonplace. The answer will only be determined over time, but Guy Laramee has found a use for old paper books that’s a lot better than just throwing them in the trash.

In a pair of collections, titled “Biblios” and “The Great Wall,” Laramee used book pages to represent strata in a number of landscape carvings. His work appears to be based on real-life mountains and canyons, and the attention to detail is just staggering.

The most incredible piece is a replica of the Grand Canyon, sandblasted out of 80 volumes of the Brittanica. It stretches four feet long, and you can see it in one of the gallery images, below. I’ve added a few of my favorites from Laramee’s two collections below, but be sure to visit his website to see the almost 20 images of his amazing work.

Guy Laramee hails from Quebec, Canada.