By choice not chance— is artist’s Hommage to the act of collecting. The original source material for the book is an archive of 44 photographs of gladiolus flowers, found in an issue of Cornell Extension Bulletin: Gladiolus Studies, published December of 1916 by New York State College of Agriculture at Cornell University.

The title of the book is a play on words: ‚By choice not chance—On Collecting’ was originally a chapter title found in a different plant publication from Wysocka’s archive. It refers to the act of collecting as well as to the structure of the book and printing process itself: 35 unique copies were created from overprinting 68 black and white plates in two different layouts—one coincidental, one intentional. It became a sort of an experiment and excercise in letting go of the artist’s control over the edit and final shape of the layout, leaving 50% of it to pure chance.

In total, this limited edition consists of over 2.300 unique prints overprinted in two layers of black Risograph ink and then bound by the artist into 35 hard cover copies.