Fragments 1968–2012
Giorgio Griffa
Published by Casey Kaplan Gallery, New York, 2013, unpaginated (colour ill.), 20.8 × 17.7 cm, English
Price: €32 (Out of stock)

Produced on the occasion of the Giorgio Griffa, Fragments 1968-2012 at Casey Kaplan Gallery. New York, October 25–December 22, 2012.

The exhibition presented a selection from over forty years of Griffa’s paintings on un-stretched canvas and linen. Throughout the past four decades, Griffa has undertaken a practice that he describes as “constant and never finished”, adhering to “the memory of material”, and to the belief that the gesture of painting is an infinite one. Within the finite frame of his canvas, each artwork becomes a site of collaboration between painting and the painter as the hand works to reveal a constellation of signs and symbols. This relationship is further mediated by the materiality of the works: the absorption of the acrylic into the fabric from each stroke dictates the brush’s next move. The completion of a canvas functions as a suspension of this relationship. After the acrylic has dried, they are carefully and neatly folded into uniform sections and filed as a register of their collective life as a whole.

#2013 #giorgiogriffa #painting
KwieKulik
Published by JRP Ringier, Geneva, 2013, 576 pages (colour & b/w ill.), 24.7 × 30.5 cm, English
Price: €49

Edited by Lukasz Ronduda and Georg Schöllhammer.

Zofia Kulik and Przemyslaw Kwiek (KwieKulik) since the 1970s pioneered the transformation of artistic practice into social experimentation. KwieKulik sought to reconcile artistic praxis with everyday life, essentially basing on the premise that form is a fact of society. The couple’s pioneering approach to film, photography, and multi-screen slide projection epitomise their unique variation of expanded cinema.

This monograph, stemming from a long-term research project on the KwieKulik Archive, documents Zofia Kulik and Przemyslaw Kwiek’s collective works from 1971 to 1987, illuminating the radically unique position of the artists in the history of neo-avant-garde in Central Europe. The book covers and documents more than 200 events, and includes a “KwieKulik Glossary,” the collection of concepts introduced and applied by the artists. The essays in the book are featuring excerpts from texts devoted to KwieKulik in the course of the last decades.

#2013 #georgschollhammer #jrpringier #kontaktcollection #kwiekulik #performance
Piccolo Manuale dell'Espressione con la Gommapiuma
Piero Gilardi
Published by les presses du réel, Dijon & Centre d'Art Contemporain, Geneva, 2013, 24 pages (colour & b/w ill.), 21 × 29.7 cm, Italian
Price: €10

In this artist’s book, Piero Gilardi reveals his working methods and explains how to create sculptures like those he has produced since the early 1960s. A pioneer of Arte Povera and a proud advocate of an ecologically concerned undertaking in the visual arts, Gilardi is also a political activist. The technique he developed for his sculptures has often been applied to produce masks, signs, and props for rallies and demonstrations, as this book and an interview with Andrea Bellini explains. For all this and for much more—his design and fashion creations, his social endeavors, etc.—Piero Gilardi is emblematic of the evolution of art and society over the last five decades. He is an artist whose works and theoretical research are still relevant to map what art might achieve and how art might be useful in the “real world.”

#2013 #lespressesdureel #pierogilardi
Love is Colder than Capital
Published by Verlag der Buchhandlung Walther König, Köln, 2013, 304 pages (colour & b/w ill.), 21 × 27 cm, English / German
Price: €42

Produced on the occasion of the group exhibition Love is Colder than Capital at The Kunsthaus Bregenz, 2 February–14 April, 2013, which brought together 16 artists who explore the interrelationships of economics and feelings in contemporary society.

Curated by Yilmaz Dzierwior and including artists Neil Beloufa, Minerva Cuevas, Mariechen Danz, Isa Genzken, Hans Haacke, Keith Haring, Teresa Margolles, Ken Okiishi, Julika Rudelius, Yorgos Sapountzis, Cindy Sherman, Andreas Siekmann, Dirk Stewen, Pascale Marthine Tayou, Rosemarie Trockel, Cathy Wilkes.

#2013 #cathywilkes #cindysherman #dirkstewen #hanshaacke #isagenzken #keithharing #kenokiishi #rosemarietrockel #teresamargolles #yilmazdziewior
Theresa Hak Kyung Cha: Berkeley–1968
Elvan Zabunyan
Published by les presses du réel, Dijon, 2013, 236 pages (b/w ill.), 15 × 21 cm, French
Price: €18 (Temporarily out of stock)

From the mid-1970s until her death at age 31 in 1982, Korean-born artist Theresa Hak Kyung Cha created a rich body of conceptual art that explored displacement and loss. Her works included artists’ books, mail art, performance, audio, video, film, and installation. Although grounded in French psychoanalytic film theory, her art is also informed by far-ranging cultural and symbolic references, from shamanism to Confucianism and Catholicism. Her collage-like book Dictée, which was published posthumously in 1982, is recognized as an influential investigation of identity in the context of history, ethnicity and gender.

#2013 #theresahakkyungcha
Capitol Complex / Ulterior Vistas
Tris Vonna-Michell
Published by Mount Analogue, Stockholm, 2013, gatefold vinyl LP + book (softcover) 2 tracks (8'19 / 6'10), 44 pages (colour ill.), English
Price: €30

Tris Vonna-Michell’s artist’s record/book is constructed around two works, Capitol Complex (2012–2014) and Ulterior Vistas (2012–2013), both of which are encapsulated on a ten-inch vinyl record. The spoken-word compositions are enclosed within a gatefold design and accompanied by the Capitol Complex manuscript as a booklet insert and a bound series of Ulterior Vistas photographic montages.

British artist Tris Vonna-Michell (born 1982 in Southend-on-Sea, England, lives and works in London and Berlin) is a memory traveler who runs through the past and present. In his works, images, sound, light, and the most ordinary objects become the material of a totally individual experience where reality and fiction merge, and journey, memories, and invention coexist.

More information on the work can be found here and here.

#2013 #lprecord #mountanalogue #trisvonnamichell