Another brilliant collaboration between poet Jordan Trethewey and painter Marcel Herms, Unexpected Mergers is a haunting, and often hilarious, conversation. An emblem book for the 21st century.Jordan Trethewey gets it right. His collaborations with Marcel Herms are truly, as the title declares, Unexpected Mergers. This is Trethewey and Herms’ second collaboration in three years, and like 2019’s Spirits For Sale, the tone is dark, creepy, dare I say Goth, and highly imaginative. As a writer who is comfortable working with artists, Trethewey’s words do more than respond to the images; they inhabit them. Looking through and reading Unexpected Mergers becomes a chicken and the egg proposition: what came first, the image or the text? While there is a Goth sensibility to the entire book, there is also an underlying lyrical wit that transforms the readers’ experience to one of, if not joy, then pleasure. This is a book that has to be seen to be believed, so take a dive into the strange world of Trethewey and Herms; you’ll relish the experience.
