'Transylvania, 1893’: Artist's contribution to World Book Night 2026, The Mountains are Calling: The Mountains Are Calling… An exhibition for World Book Night 2026 Bower Ashton Library, UWE Bristol Thursday 2nd April* – Friday 31st July 2026

WBN United Artists put out a call for responses to a text or book about mountains. Our starting point for 2026 was recommended by Nancy Campbell – Nan Shepherd’s book The Living Mountain: A Celebration of the Cairngorm Mountains of Scotland, Canongate Canons, 2011.

We invited artists, writers, students and the public to make work and send us a recommendation for a shared bibliography of mountains inspired reading. We received 200+ entries from 188 artists in Argentina, Australia, Austria, Brazil, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Malaysia, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, UK, USA.

We have artworks ranging from 3D bookworks and collages, to watercolours, oil paintings, letterpress prints, drypoints, etchings, monotypes, relief prints, screenprints, foil lithography, rust prints, rubber stamps, typewriter art, Tetra Pak prints, cinderella stamps, ink, calligraphy, altered and cut-out books, tunnel books, handwritten books, photography and textworks. The display includes origami mountains, foil topped mountains made from recycled tea boxes, mountains painted onto recycled dress patterns, folded from old cereal packets, embroidered and handstitched textiles, works made in reference to novels or other artists’ books, non-fiction, poetry, published speeches and letters.

Hobbs's contribution:
‘Transylvania, 1983’ inspired by Dracula, Bram Stoker (1897)
Collage. 190mm x 130mm