The Twin Plays: Port-au-Prince & Adams County Illinois
Jackson Mac Low
Published by Primary Information, New York, 2007, 14 pages, 13.5 × 21.5 cm, English
Price: €18

2007 reprint of a 1966 Great Bear Pamphlet.

Two dramas that explore improvisation and chance by the innovative poet Jackson Mac Low. In each, Mac Low gives the hypothetical performer general instructions arrived at through chance operations involving various linguistic structures. In Port-au-Prince, the speeches consist of “pseudo-sentences” that appear as though they make sense but in fact do not. Adams County Illinois uses the same structure but consists of folk-sayings quoted from the 1935 Folk-Lore from Adams County Illinois by Harry Middleton Hyatt.

#2007 #jacksonmaclow #primaryinformation
Equitable Sharing
Cameron Rowland
Published by The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, 2018, unpaginated (colour & b/w ill.), 28 × 21.6 cm, English
Price: €8.83 (Out of stock)

2017 Equitable Sharing payments by state.

The Department of the Treasury Equitable Sharing Program allows law enforcement agencies to contribute cash and assets to the Federal Treasury Forfeiture Fund. The primary purpose of the Treasury Forfeiture Fund is to administer federal auctions of these assets and distribute the proceeds from the auctions. Participating agencies receive up to 80% of the cash and the proceeds from the sale of assets they contribute. In states that restrict the forfeiture revenue directed to the seizing agency, police departments are incentivized to participate in the federal program.

The 2017 average revenue from sales proceeds from property seized and auctioned for each participating agency was $57,967. The 2017 average revenue from cash forfeiture for each participating agency was $71,959.

Through the widespread targeting of low-value assets, the Equitable Sharing Program generated a total of $84,283,266 in sales proceeds and $211,277,289 in cash seizures for police.

#2018 #cameronrowland
Lips
Man Ray
Published by Fotofolio, New York, 1988, card (b/w ill.), 15.1 × 10.8 cm, English
Price: €8

*Please note this publication is secondhand and has some traces of previous ownership.

#1988 #ephemera #manray #photography
Portraits
Ghislaine Leung
Published by Städtisches Museum Abteiberg, Mönchengladbach, 2021, box containing 3 A4 stapled documents, 6 cards, fluorescent lamp, usb cord, instructions and object (colour & b/w ill.), 16.3 × 20.7 cm, English / German
Price: €54

Produced on the occasion of Portraits a solo exhibition by Ghislaine Leung displayed at Museum Abteiberg from 3 June–24 October, 2021, curated by Susanne Titz and Haris Giannouras. The exhibition comprised of works commissioned by Museum Abteiberg and produced over the duration of a year from 2020–21. The catalogue references the legendary box catalogues developed by previous museum director Johannes Cladders with Joseph Beuys in 1967. With essays from Bruce Hainley and Eleanor Ivory Weber.

You can see a round table discussion of the exhibition featuring Bruce Hainley, Fatima Hellberg & Susanne Titz and Haris Giannouras here.

#2021 #brucehainley #eleanorivoryweber #ghislaineleung #harisgiannouras #johannescladders #museumabteiberg #susannetitz
Termite Economies
Nicholas Mangan
Published by Bom Dia Boa Tarde Boa Noite, Berlin, 2021, 152 pages (colour & b/w ill.), 17.5 × 24.5 cm, English
Price: €34

This publication assembles three phases of Termite Economies, a major series of artworks produced between 2018–2020 by the Australian artist Nicholas Mangan.

In Termite Economies (Phase 1) Mangan researched an anecdote that termite abilities might one day lead humans to gold deposits. Phase 2 explored termite eusociality, pheromonal communication, building behaviour, biomimicry, super-organism and swarm intelligence. Phase 3 deployed termite collectivism as a speculative model for rerouting human neural pathways. Within each phase, Mangan developed specific methods to explore these phenomena formally, spatially, and through moving images.

The book presents each phase in the order of the exhibition series. It includes process and research photographs, diagrams, installation and detailed imagery. It includes an essay by Artist Mariana Silva, a fictional text by writer ST.Lore, a conversation between Mangan and cultural theorist Ana Teixeira Pinto, and a republished essay by Dr. Guy Theraulaz. Designed by Žiga Testen.

#2021 #anateixeirapinto #bomdiaboatardeboanoite #nicholasmangan #stlore #zigatesten
Otto Meyer-Amden
Michael Stettler
Published by AZ Presse, Aarau, 1965, 60 pages (colour & b/w ill.), 23 × 28 cm, German
Price: €23 (Out of stock)

In the transition from Symbolism to international modernism that occurred between Ferdinand Hodler and Mondrian, no other Swiss artist succeeded in creating an oeuvre as confident and idiosyncratic as that of Otto Meyer-Amden. Born in 1885 in Bern, Meyer initially trained as a lithographer before attending the School of Arts and Crafts in Zürich. Following a semester at the Academy of Arts in Munich, he joined the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Stuttgart in 1907, where he studied for a short time under Adolf Hölzel, whose interest in abstract formal principles set him apart from the prevailing naturalism of the time. It was there that he encountered Willi Baumeister and Oskar Schlemmer, with whom he would go on to maintain a close exchange until his death, exerting a strong influence on the pair.

#1965 #ottomeyeramden