Form an orderly Q

Q – the name of James Bond’s armourer, the seventeenth letter of the alphabet and the inspiration for illustrator Katja Spitzer’s new book Quodlibet.

Quodlibet features Spitzer’s illustrations of a host of different words, phrases and names all beginning with the letter Q.

So featured in the book are cult Hollywood directors, 18th-century dances, ancient Chinese mythical beasts and French poets of the last century (that’s – we think – Quentin Tarantino, the quadrille, qilins and Raymond Queneau…)

Spitzer says the book, written with Sebastian Gievert, was inspired by Georges Perec’s novel Les Revenentes, in which E is the only vowel used. She chose to focus on Q because in her native German – as in English – Q is a peculiar and rarely used letter.

To mark the book’s launch The Book Club in London is hosting an exhibition of Spitzer’s work.

Alongside illustrations from Quodlibet will be other examples of her practice, including from 365 Women – a project which saw Spitzer create a portrait of a woman every day for a year (Minka, Norda and Zora pictured).

The Quodlibet book is published by Nowbrow Press, priced at £15 (available at http://www.nobrow.net/6384). The Quodlibet exhibition is at The Book Club, London EC2, from 27 October-15 January 2012.