The scorched, mutilated book wrapped in an incomplete wire grid is Nicastri's visual metaphor for the Holocaust and the Nazi burning of Jewish books. The wooden pine box without nails signifies the Jewish coffin. -- Source of annotation: Marvin or Ruth Sackner.

The title of the book Nicasti used is "Surgery: Its Principles & Practice." The front cover is opened with rows of nails on the outside front cover. The back cover has an attached wooden box containing a shattered plexiglas cylinder and gauge. An abstract plexiglas form is built into the fastened pages of the book. A small sculptural element, composed of a collaged wooden fragment with rows of nails, contains a partial index of the medical text. -- Source of annotation: Marvin or Ruth Sackner.

This sculpture provides a visual/verbal vignette of the fragility of the first breath of life. -- Source of annotation: Marvin or Ruth Sackner.