Friday Fun: Library Phantom Returns

A friend of mine posted the link to this story and I thought it would be perfect for a little Friday Fun. 

Edinburgh, Scotland has a library phantom sculptor who has been leaving beautiful paper sculptures made from books  in libraries and museums in the area. 

NPR first reported on the library phantom sculptor in late October describing how librarian, Julie Johnstone, found a sculpture of a tree made of twisted paper on a book with a broken gold leafed eggshell filled with strips of paper from the poem, “A Trace of Wings.”

Photo by: Chris Scott/flickr

 

It didn’t end with the tree.  The sculptures kept coming. A coffin, topped by a large gramophone showed up suddenly at The National Library of Scotland.  A local art film theater found a book carved with warriors leaping off a movie screen  into the audience.  Then came a little dragon peeking out of an egg at The Scottish Storytelling Centre.  The gifts kept coming, and it became quite a mystery as to who the very talented person could be.  BBC, Scotland TV, and The Guardian all reported on the story. Who was this mysterious person? 

Well it seems we will never know because even though there are a few suspects (a former music librarian thought he recognized the style from a paper sculpture he bought from an artist) it seems the public wants to keep the mystery alive and doesn’t want to know the artist’s identity.  The mystery artist remains a mystery and sadly as the latest NPR story says, the gifts have come to an end this November. 

Let me just tell the mystery artist, if she is ever in the United States, I am sure there are quite a few libraries that would love to get such a beautiful and unique gift.  Why not make the mystery international?!

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