World Food Books' programme is largely produced on Kulin Nation land. We acknowledge the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation as the first and continuing custodians of this land, and pay respect to their Elders past, present, and emerging.
World Food Books is an arts and special interests bookshop in Naarm / Melbourne. Founded in 2010, World Food Books is devoted to the presentation of a rotating, hand-selection of international art, design, literary and counterculture publications with an emphasis on the anti-traditional, the experimental, the avant-garde, the heretic, the marginal.
Presenting new titles alongside rare and out-of-print books, catalogues and journals spanning the fields of modern and contemporary art, design, photography, illustration, film, literature, poetry, cultural theory, philosophy, sexuality, popular and underground culture in its many radical forms, World Food Books wishes to encourage adventurous, thoughtful and open-minded reading, looking, writing, and exchange of publishing and ideas, both current and historical.
As well as our bookshop, located in Melbourne's historical Nicholas Building, all of our inventory is available internationally via our online mail-order service.
World Food Books semi-regularly co-ordinates "Occasions", a programme of exhibits and events at the bookshop and in partnership with other hosts (such as museums and art galleries) that develop out of the activities, relationships and content of the bookshop itself.
World Food Books
The Nicholas Building
37 Swanston Street
Room 5, Level 6
Melbourne 3000
Australia
SHOP HOURS:
OPEN 12—5 THU—FRI
WEB-SHOP OPEN 24/7.
World Food Books
Postal Address:
PO Box 435
Flinders Lane
Victoria 8009
Australia
Art
Theory / Essay
Architecture / Interior
Graphic Design / Typography
Photography
Fashion
Eros
LGBTQ+
Fiction / Poetry
Weird / Speculative / Science Fiction / Horror
Transgressive / Visceral / Abject
Symbolism / Decadence / Fin de siècle
Film / Video
Painting
Sculpture / Installation
Performance / Dance / Theater
Drawing
Sound / Music
Curatorial
Group Shows / Collections
Periodicals
Out-of-print / Rare
Posters / Ephemera / Discs
Signed Books
World Food Books Gift Voucher
World Food Book Bag
Australian Art
Australian Photography
Japanese Photography
Conceptual Art
Minimal Art
Dada
'Pataphysics / Oulipo
Fluxus
Concrete Poetry
Pop Art
Surrealism
Arte Povera
Arte Informale / Haute Pâte / Tachism
Nouveau Réalisme / Zero / Kinetic
Situationism / Lettrism
Collage / Mail Art / Xerox Art
Art Brut / Folk / Visionary / Fantastic
Illustration / Graphic Art / Bandes Dessinées
Furniture
Italian Radical Design / Postmodernism
Textiles
Ceramics / Glass
Counterculture
Protest / Revolt
Anarchism
Socialism / Communism / Capitalism
Literary Theory / Semiotics / Language
Feminism
Fetishism / BDSM
Drugs / Psychedelia
Crime / Violence
Animal Rights / Veganism
Occult / Esoterica
Ecology / Earth / Alternative Living
Whole Earth / Crafts
All prices in AUD (Australian dollars)
Pick-Ups
Please note: The bookshop is closed until February 1, 2024.
Pick-up orders can be collected in our bookshop during opening hours after this date. Please collect any Pick-up orders within 3 weeks of ordering as we have limited storage space. Orders will be released back into stock if not collected within this time. No refunds can be made for pick-ups left un-collected.
Return Policy
All sales are final. We do accept returns (for refund, exchange) for items received in error. All our orders are packed with special care using heavy-duty padding and cardboard book-mailers or bubble mailers (for smaller books), using reinforcement where required. We cannot take responsibility for any lost, stolen or damaged parcels.
Insurance
Should you wish to insure your package, please email us directly after placing your order and we can organise this at a small extra expense. Although all standard/express tracked packages are very safe and dependable, we cannot take responsibility for any lost, stolen or damaged parcels. We recommend insurance on valuable orders.
Interested in selling your old books, catalogues, journals, magazines, comics, fanzines, ephemera? We are always looking for interesting, unusual and out-of-print books to buy. We only buy books in our fields of interest and specialty, and that we feel we can resell.
We base these prices on desirability, market value, in-print prices, condition and our current stock levels. We offer cash, store credit, and can take stock on consignment. All
about 25% of the price we expect to get when we sell them, or 30% in store credit. We base these prices on desirability, market value, in-print prices, condition and our current stock levels.
Sell your books any day of the week. You can drop them off and return later. If you have a lot of books, we can visit your Sydney home.
We buy books that we feel we can resell. We offer about 25 % of the price we expect to get when we sell them, or 30% in store credit. We base these prices on desirability, market value, in-print prices, condition and our current stock levels.
Philadelphia Wireman
03 August - 01 September, 2018
World Food Books is proud to announce our next Occasion, the first presentation of sculptures by Philadelphia Wireman in Australia.
The Philadelphia Wireman sculptures were found abandoned in an alley off Philadelphia’s South Street on trash night in 1982. Their discovery in a rapidly-changing neighbourhood undergoing extensive renovation, compounded with the failure of all attempts to locate the artist, suggests that the works may have been discarded after the maker’s death. Dubbed the "Philadelphia Wireman" during the first exhibition of this work, in 1985, the maker’s name, age, ethnicity, and even gender remain uncertain. The entire collection totals approximately 1200 pieces, all intricately bound together with tightly-wound heavy-gauge wire (along with a few small, abstract marker drawings, reminiscent both of Mark Tobey and J.B. Murry). The dense construction of the work, despite a modest range of scale and materials, is singularly obsessive and disciplined in design: a wire armature or exoskeleton firmly binds a bricolage of found objects including plastic, glass, food packaging, umbrella parts, tape, rubber, batteries, pens, leather, reflectors, nuts and bolts, nails, foil, coins, toys, watches, eyeglasses, tools, and jewellery.
Heavy with associations—anthropomorphic, zoomorphic, and socio-cultural responses to wrapped detritus—the totemic sculptures by Philadelphia Wireman have been discussed in the context of work created to fulfil the shamanistic needs of alternative religions in American culture. Curators, collectors, and critics have variously compared certain pieces to sculpture from Classical antiquity, Native American medicine bundles, African-American memory jugs, and African fetish objects. Reflecting the artist’s prolific and incredibly focused scavenging impulse, and despite—or perhaps enhanced by—their anonymity, these enigmatic objects function as urban artefacts and arbiters of power, though their origin and purpose is unknown. Philadelphia Wireman, whatever their identity, possessed an astonishing ability to isolate and communicate the concepts of power and energy through the selection and transformation of ordinary materials. Over the course of the past two decades, this collection has come to be regarded as an important discovery in the field of self-taught art and vernacular art.
Presented in collaboration with Fleisher-Ollman Gallery, Philadelphia, and Robert Heald, Wellington.
Susan Te Kahurangi King
02 February - 10 March, 2018
Susan Te Kahurangi King (24 February 1951 - ) has been a confident and prolific artist since she was a young child, drawing with readily available materials - pencils, ballpoint pens and felt-tip markers, on whatever paper is at hand. Between the ages of four and six Susan slowly ceased verbal communication. Her grandparents William and Myrtle Murphy had developed a special bond with Susan so they took on caring responsibilities for extended periods. Myrtle began informally archiving her work, carefully collecting and storing the drawings and compiling scrapbooks. No drawing was insignificant; every scrap of paper was kept. The King family are now the custodians of a vast collection containing over 7000 individual works, from tiny scraps of paper through to 5 meter long rolls.
The scrapbooks and diaries reveal Myrtle to be a woman of great patience and compassion, seeking to understand a child who was not always behaving as expected. She encouraged Susan to be observant, to explore her environment and absorb all the sights and sounds. Myrtle would show Susan’s drawings to friends and people in her community that she had dealings with, such as shopkeepers and postal workers, but this was not simply a case of a grandmother’s bias. She recognised that Susan had developed a sophisticated and unique visual language and sincerely believed that her art deserved serious attention.
This was an unorthodox attitude for the time. To provide some context, Jean Dubuffet coined the term Art Brut in 1945 to describe work created by self-taught artists – specifically residents of psychiatric institutions and those he considered to be visionaries or eccentrics. In 1972 Roger Cardinal extended this concept by adopting the term Outsider Art to describe work made by non-academically trained artists operating outside of mainstream art networks through choice or circumstance. Susan was born in Te Aroha, New Zealand in 1951, far from the artistic hubs of Paris and London that Dubuffet and Cardinal operated in. That Myrtle fêted Susan as a self-taught artist who deserved to be taken seriously shows how progressive her attitudes were.
Susan’s parents Doug and Dawn were also progressive. Over the years they had consulted numerous health practitioners about Susan’s condition, as the medical establishment could not provide an explanation as to why she had lapsed into silence. Dawn educated herself in the field of homeopathy and went on to treat all twelve of her children using these principles – basing prescriptions on her observations of their physical, mental and emotional state.
Doug was a linguist with an interest in philosophy who devoted what little spare time he had to studying Maori language and culture. To some extent their willingness to explore the fringes of the mainstream made them outsiders too but it was their commitment to living with integrity and their respect for individuality that ensured Susan’s creativity was always encouraged.
Even though Susan’s family supported her artistic pursuits, some staff in schools and hospitals saw it as an impediment to her assimilation into the community and discouraged it in a variety of ways. Her family was not always aware of this and therefore did not fully understand why Susan stopped drawing in the early 1990s. However, rather than dwell on the challenges that Susan faced in pursuit of her artistic practice, they prefer to highlight her achievements. In 2008 Susan began drawing again in earnest, after an almost 20 year interruption, and her work is now shown in galleries around the world.
Susan grew up without television and has been heavily influenced by the comics she read as a child. She is absolutely fearless in the appropriation of recognizable characters, such as Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse, in her work. She twists their limbs, contorts their faces, compresses them together, blends them into complex patterned backgrounds - always imbuing them with an incredible energy. Although Susan often used pop culture characters in her work they are not naive or childlike. These are drawings by a brilliant self-taught artist who has been creating exceptional work for decades without an audience in mind.
Mladen Stilinović
"Various Works 1986 - 1999"
02 February 16 - September 10, 2016
Various works 1986 - 1999, from two houses, from the collections of John Nixon, Sue Cramer, Kerrie Poliness, Peter Haffenden and Phoebe Haffenden.
Including: Geometry of Cakes (various shelves), 1993; Poor People’s Law (black and white plate), 1993; White Absence (glasses, ruler, set square, silver spoon, silver ladel with skin photograph and wooden cubes), 1990-1996; Exploitation of the Dead (grey and red star painting, wooden painting, black spoon with red table, red plate), 1984-1990; Money and Zeros (zero tie, paintings made for friends in Australia (Sue, John, Kerrie), numbers painting), 1991-1992; Words - Slogans (various t-shirts) - “they talk about the death of art...help! someone is trying to kill me”, “my sweet little lamb”, “work is a disease - Karl Marx”; Various artist books, catalogues, monographs, videos; Poster from exhibition Insulting Anarchy; "Circular" Croatian - Australian edition; Artist book by Vlado Martek (Dostoyevsky); more.
Thanks to Mladen Stilinović and Branka Stipančić.
Jonathan Walker
Always Will Need To Wear Winter Shirt Blue + Ochre Small Check Pattern
21 August - 21 September, 2015
Untitled
I am not a great reader of poetry but I always return to the work of Melbourne poet, Vincent Buckley (1925- 1988). Perhaps I find his most tantalising piece to be not a finished poem but a fragment left on a scrap of paper discovered on his desk after the poet’s death.
The poetry gathers like oil
In the word-core, and spreads
It has its music meet,
Its music is in movement.
This fragment is more the shell left behind from a volatile thought than a finished poem. I find the last two lines honest but awkward whereas the first two lines work like an arrow. Most likely he could not find a resolution so it was left. Still, in its present form, it remains an eloquent testimony to the ultimate failure of a medium to express mobile thought and sensation, in Buckley’s case, through verbal language. It’s an important matter because this is something all artists have to deal with regardless of the medium.
I have never written a poem, however, I am forever copying fragments from books on paper scraps in a vain effort to fix certain notions in my head. At first, they function as bookmarks that are sometimes returned to when I open the book. But before long, as they accumulate, they fall out littering the table interspersed with A4 photocopies, bills, books and medications.
To return to Buckley’s fragment, the first two lines very much evoke how I paint nowadays. As you age, detail diminishes and patches of light become more luminous and float. I feel the most honest way of dealing with this is by smearing the oil paint on the canvas with the fingers and working close-up, blind. Only if the patches coalesce into an approaching image can the work gain a life.
-
Jonathan Walker was born in Melbourne, Australia and brought up on a dairy farm in Gippsland. In the 1970’s he studied painting at RMIT and won the Harold Wright Scholarship to the British Museum, London. During the 1980’s he exhibited at Pinacotheca Gallery, Richmond and had work shown at the NGV and Heidi City Art Gallery. Over the same period he designed the cover for the “Epigenesi” LP by Giancarlo Toniutti, Italy and conducted a mail exchange work with Achim Wollscheid, Germany. The work with artists through the post resulted in an article published in the bicentenary issue of Art and Australia 1988. He showed in artist run spaces such as WestSpace in the 90’s and 2000’s, and until 2012, taught painting at Victoria University, which is where we (Colleen Ahern and Lisa Radford) as organisers of the exhibition, among many others, had the privilege of being his student.
Walker’s knowledge was imparted to students through the careful selection of music, literature, and artists found in books that he himself had ordered for the library. Walker’s strategy was the generosity of sharing his vast knowledge with references specific to each student and their context.
Walker’s paintings share a similar focus and intimacy.
This exhibition presents a small selection of recent paintings alongside a publication that includes Walker’s writing. Observational and analytical, Walker’s work is a type of material notation — the time of day, colour and how it is blended, the both specific and fleeting location of a reflection on lino or the question of whether a chair leg should be included in a painting.
Please join us on Friday August 21 between 6-8pm to celebrate the opening of the exhibition.
Curated by Colleen Ahern and Lisa Radford.
B. Wurtz
Curated by Nic Tammens
March 26 - April 4, 2015
B.Wurtz works from a basement studio in his home on Manhattan’s Lower East Side.
This local fact is attested to by the plastic shopping bags and newsprint circulars that appear in his work. As formal objects, they don’t make loud claims about their origins but nonetheless transmit street addresses and places of business from the bottom of this long thin island. Like plenty of artists, Wurtz is affected by what is local and what is consumed. His work is underpinned by this ethic. It often speaks from a neighborhood or reads like the contents of a hamper:
“BLACK PLUMS $1.29 lb.”
“Food Bazaar”
“USDA Whole Pork Shoulder Picnic 99c lb.”
“RITE AID Pharmacy, with us it’s personal.”
“H. Brickman & Sons.”
“Sweet Yams 59c lb."
Most of the work in this exhibition was made while the artist was in residence at Dieu Donne, a workshop dedicated to paper craft in Midtown. Here Wurtz fabricated assemblages with paper and objects that are relatively lightweight, with the intention that they would be easily transportable to Australia. This consideration isn’t absolute in Wurtz’s work, but was prescriptive for making the current exhibition light and cheap. Packed in two boxes, these works were sent from a USPS post office on the Lower East Side and delivered to North Melbourne by Australia Post.
Wurtz appears courtesy of Metro Pictures, New York.
Thanks to Rob Halverson, Joshua Petherick, Sari de Mallory, Matt Hinkley, Helen Johnson, Fayen d'Evie, Ask Kilmartin, Lisa Radon, Ellena Savage, Yale Union, and "Elizabeth".
John Nixon
"Archive"
December 15 - January 20, 2014
The presentation of John Nixon's archive offered a rare showcase of this extensive collection of the artist's own publications, catalogues, posters, ephemera, editions and more, from the mid 1980s onwards, alongside a selection of his artworks.
Organized by John Nixon, Joshua Petherick and Matt Hinkley.
"Habitat"
at Minerva, Sydney (organised by Joshua Petherick and Matt Hinkley)
November 15 - December 20, 2014
Lupo Borgonovo, Janet Burchill & Jennifer McCamley,
Lewis Fidock, HR Giger, Piero Gilardi, Veit Laurent Kurz,
Cinzia Ruggeri, Michael E. Smith, Lucie Stahl, Daniel Weil, Wols
Press Release:
“...It contained seven objects. The slender fluted bone, surely formed for flight, surely from the wing of some large bird. Three archaic circuitboards, faced with mazes of gold. A smooth white sphere of baked clay. An age-blackened fragment of lace. A fingerlength segment of what she assumed was bone from a human wrist, grayish white, inset smoothly with the silicon shaft of a small instrument that must once have ridden flush with the surface of the skin - but the thing’s face was seared and blackened.”
William Gibson, “Count Zero”, 1986
"Autumn Projects Archive"
Curated by Liza Vasiliou
March 6 - March 15, 2014
World Food Books, in conjunction with the Virgin Australia Melbourne Fashion Festival 2014, presented the Autumn Projects archive, consisting of a selection of early examples in Australian fashion with a particular interest in collecting designers and labels from the period beginning in the 1980’s, who significantly influenced the discourse of Australian Fashion.
Curated by Liza Vasiliou, the exhibition provided a unique opportunity to view pieces by designers Anthea Crawford, Barbara Vandenberg, Geoff Liddell and labels CR Australia, Covers, Jag along with early experimental collage pieces by Prue Acton and Sally Browne’s ‘Fragments’ collection, suspended throughout the functioning World Food Books shop in Melbourne.
H.B. Peace
presented by CENTRE FOR STYLE
November 14, 2013
"Hey Blinky, you say chic, I say same"
Anon 2013
H.B. Peace is a clothing collaboration between great friends Blake Barns and Hugh Egan Westland. Their pieces explore the divergences between 'character’ and ‘personality’ in garments....etc
Special Thanks to Joshua Petherick and Matt Hinkley of WFB and Gillian Mears
and a Very Special Thank you to Audrey Thomas Hayes for her shoe collaboration.
Janet Burchill & Jennifer McCamley
"Aesthetic Suicide"
May 10 - June 8, 2013
The first of our occasional exhibitions in the World Food Books office/shop space in Melbourne, "Aesthetic Suicide" presented a body of new and older works together by artists Janet Burchill & Jennifer McCamley, including videos, prints, a wall work, and publications.
During shop open hours videos played every hour, on the hour.
1984, English / Japanese
Softcover, 96 pages, 27.2 x 21.4 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
Doremi Music / Japan
$180.00 - Out of stock
The super rare Visual of Heavy Metal (The Heavy Metal Music Encyclopedia), published in Japan in one small edition in 1984! No text fluff, this book is cover-to-cover blazing full-colour reproductions of Heavy Metal album art, published at the height of metal's international break-out. NWOBHM, Speed Metal, Hard Rock, Glam Metal, Thrash... UK, USA, Sweden, France, Australia, Canada... Iron Maiden, Ethel The Frog, Mercyful Fate, Anvil, Exciter, Girl School, Black Sabbath, Samson, The Rods, Venom, Mother's Finest, Killer Dwarfs, Alkatrazz, Praying Mantis, Riot, Cloven Hoof, Gotham City, Raven, Witchfynde, Ostrogoth, Satan Jokers, Satan, Demon Eyes, Chateaux, Blaspheme, Fist, Sortilège, Pink Fairies, Anthrax, Queensrÿche, Heavy Pettin, Alaska, Helstar, Ratt, AC/DC, Jack Starr, Gamma, H-Bomb, Virgin Steele, Black Alice, Spider Force, Dio, Maccoy, Tygers Of Pan Tang, Band Of Joy, Scorpions, Wild Dogs, Kiss, Def Leppard, Alvin Lee, Heaven, Sledgehammer, Electric Sun, Colosseum II, Harman Rarebell, Tank, Pantera, Tokyo Blade, The Michael Schenker Strife Group, Budgie, Wolf, Nazareth, Status Quo, Judas Priest, Icon, Torch, British Lions, Rush, Pandemonium, Crucifixion, Thin Lizzy, Victim, Accept, Trouble Manillaroad, Witch Killer, Crawler, Faithful, Breath, Gary Moore, Trance, Silver Mountain, Slayer, Hawkwind, Helix, The Handsome Beats, Motorhead, Tank, Warrior, Manowar, Picture, Ufo, Rainbow, Alcatrazz, High Power, Warning, Battle Axe, Victim, W.A.S.P., Tsunami, Metallica, Cirith Ungol, Molly Hatchet, Biscaya, Meat Loaf, Bernie Tormé, Talas, Sinner, Chariot, Alien, Thor, Mad Max, Sad Iron, Grave Digger, Mass, Rick Derringer, Santer, Warning, Witchfinder, Be Bop Deluxe, Force, Blue Oyster Cult, Dark Wizard, Twisted Sister, Faithful Breath, Dark Heart, Thunder Fire, Cutty Sark, Night Wing, Cross Fire, Demon, Ostrogoth, Spartan Warrior, Voivod, Joshua, Omen, Elf, Uriah Heep, John Cale, Ian Gillan Band, Cozy Powell, Status Quo, Ted Nugent, Krokus, White Snake, Twisted Sister, Triumph, Wild Dogs, Steeler, Culprit Exciter Randy Hansen, Chris Spedding, Mama's Boys, Acid, Legs Diamond, Le Mans, Killer, Holocaust, Coney Hatch, Dark Star, Waysted, Brian May, Vic Vergat, Robin Trower, Quiet Riot, Ozzy Ozbourne, Gary Moore, Axewitch, Pretty Maids, Grim Reaper, Blade Runner, Black Angels, Captain Beyond, and so many more! Compiled by Masateru Makino. No text, only catalogue data for each LP, full index, appendix, colophon. An excellent reference and visual onslaught.
Very Good copy.
1988, Japanese
Softcover, 300 pages, 21 x 14.7 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
First Publishing / Japan
$80.00 - In stock -
One of the more obscure Japanese hardcore SM magazines, SM Secret was edited by Hiroshi Kawate and published by Takanori Shinya, and later Ryoichi Matomaru, between the late 1980s to the early 2000s. Wrapped in possibly the most bold, startling airbrushed covers of the genre, SM Secret was a glossy magazine dedicated to fetish/bdsm, born out the publication "Orange People" — one of the magazines that led the "husband and wife exchange" boom in the 80's. To be expected, this magazine too centres around amateur reader exchange of "Secret" sexual customs and fet-life behind closed doors, filled with photographic features, photographic Secret letters and stories from readers, articles, fetish advertisements, most heavy on photo features of femdom, malesub, torture, cross-dressing, wax play, rubber dress, bondage, urolagnia and queen/mistress S&M.
Very Good copy.
1996, Japanese
Softcover, 300 pages, 21.2 x 15.1 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / good
Published by
Shishobo / Tokyo
$60.00 - In stock -
SM Secret Club Vol. 7, an obscure Japanese bondage and fetishism magazine from the early—mid 1990s, published by the legendary Shishobo, a faction of Tokyo Sanseisha responsible for SM Fan, SM Frontier, Novel SM Fan, and others, closely related to Sanwa publishing. August 1996 issue is packed with vivid colour hardcore fetish photography of all manner of depraved SM bondage themes including urolagnia and coprophilia, and featuring models/pink actresses Hitomi Kurosawa, Rika Aoki, Yui Kawana and many others. Not for the faint hearted.
Good copy with some edge and corner wear.
1992, Japanese
Softcover, 84 pages, 21.5 cm x 30 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
Tsukasa Shobo / Tokyo
$90.00 - Out of stock
Published in Japan in 1992, BIZARRE JAPAN — Super Fetish Photo Collection Of Far East, is a glossy special edition photo volume published by Japanese bondage magazine Bizarre Japan, comprising entirely of their photoshoots of female fetish fashion wear designed by Z2. Features models Maiko Amagi, Nao Saejima, Reiko Suma, Reika, Mariko Kishi, and Kaoru ‘O’ in vivid colour glamour spreads, followed by a full catalogue of fetish wear. Scarce title!
Very Good copy.
1993, Japanese
Softcover, 300 pages, 21.2 x 15.1 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
Kasakura / Tokyo
$60.00 - In stock -
Published in Winter 1993, issue 12 of L&M (Lesbian & Masochism), published by Kasakura Publishing, originally as a special edition of Video X magazine, then onward as its own publication from the late 1980s until 1994. The title says it all, vivid colour photo features and content centring around lesbian and masochism fetish Queen themes, with regular photography by Norio Sugiura ( SM Fan, SM Select, etc.), Koji Yuhara, Shiko Shima ( Specialty S&M, Yume Club, Speculum, etc.), and models such as Mori Miki, Izumi Kawakami, Sachiko Sugiura, Tomomi Harada, Ayumu Hibino Mai Ito, Reika Mizuki, Queen Serina, Queen Mizuki, Ayaka Shiki, and many others.
Very Good copy.
1991, Japanese/English
Softcover (w. dust jacket), 60 pages, 29.7 x 21 cm
1st UK Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
Tsukasa Shobo / Tokyo
$90.00 - Out of stock
CHAIN BONDAGE; ROPE BONDAGE; STOCKING BONDAGE; GUM BONDAGE; COSTUME BONDAGE; TUBE BONDAGE; RESTRAINTS — FANTASTIC PHOTOS OF BONDAGE ART; SWEET, SWEET CHAIN; FOXY BLACK B&D DOLL; BOUND IN A CHAIR; COSTUME LAND; BONDAGE CLINIC; LADIES IN RESTRAINT; PRISONER...
Very rare and published in 1991, "Bound Lady" ("The Magazine For and By Bondagers") is a full-colour glossy SM photo collection by photographer and kinbakushi Kinichi Tanaka, and body design by Go Arisue (b. 1954), one of the world's top kinbakushi. Tanaka (b. 1947) was the main photographer for the Japanese cult fetish magazine S&M Sniper throughout its existence, and both Tanaka and Arisue were contributed to SM Select and SM Fan and shot for many pink movies throughout the 1970s—1990s. Tanaka is a member of the Japan Photographic Art Society and the Shinshashinha Association. "Bound Lady" features Eri Kikuchi, Yuka Kikuchi, Arisa Himeno, Mayu Odagiri, Matsurika Abe, Manami Harada, Rie Kudo, Rena Hashimoto, Aki Sayuri, Yuka Moriguchi, Makoto Chiaki, Ai Okano, Rena Hashimoto, Ryoko Narumi, and others in themed f/f bondage photo shoots. Also features photography by Koji Yokoyama.
"diagnosis and treatment are available to slaves here"
Very Good copy.
2011, English
Softcover, 88 pages, 25.5 x 22 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / as new
Published by
Serpentine Gallery / London
Walther König / Köln
$90.00 $70.00 - In stock -
First edition of the fast out-of-print "SEE, WE ASSEMBLE" Mark Leckey catalogue.
In a multi-disciplinary practice that encompasses sculpture, sound, film and performance, Leckey explores the potential of the human imagination to appropriate and to animate a concept, an object or an environment.
Drawing on his personal experiences as a London-based artist, who spent his formative years in the north of England, Leckey returns frequently to the themes of desire and transformation.
Leckey’s fascination with the affective power of images is another recurring theme. Meticulously sourced and reconfigured archival footage is a predominant feature of some of his best-known works. Fiorucci Made Me Hardcore (1999) is a seminal exploration of the history of underground dance culture in the UK from the mid- 1970s to the early 1990s.
In the recent performance piece GreenScreenRefrigeratorAction (2010), Leckey sought to communicate the inner life of a ‘smart’ fridge – one that keeps an electronic tally of its contents – and to render audible its ‘voice’.
Included is an interview between the artist and Julia Peyton-Jones and Hans Ulrich Obrist, and an extract from a script by Mark Leckey and Martin McGeown.
Published on the occasion of the exhibition Mark Leckey: SEE, WE ASSEMBLE at Serpentine Gallery, London, May - June 2011.
As New.
1990, English
Hardcover (w. dust jacket), 358 pages, 17.5 x 23 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
October Books / New York
$90.00 - In stock -
First 1990 hardcover edition of this landmark collection of essays, Yve-Alain Bois’ Painting as Model remains to this day one of the most influential contemporary books on painting. Informed by both structuralism and poststructuralism, these essays by art critic and historian Yve Alain Bois seek to redefine the status of theory in modernist critical discourse. Warning against the uncritical adoption of theoretical fashions and equally against the a priori rejection of all theory, Bois argues that theory is best employed in response to the specific demands of a critical problem. The essays lucidly demonstrate the uses of various theoretical approaches in conjunction with close reading of both paintings and texts.
"A genuinely original contribution, in both style and approach, to a 'new history' of art which reconciles critical theory to historical research." - Louis Marin, École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, Paris
Yve-Alain Bois studied at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes under the guidance of Roland Barthes and Hubert Damisch. A founder of the French journal Macula, Bois is currently a professor in the School of Historical Studies at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, NJ.
Very Good copy w. good dust jacket.
2022, English
Softcover, , 56 pages, 21 x 15 cm
Ed. of 50,
Published by
Self-Published / Sydney
$20.00 - In stock -
Movements, imprints and textures of environmental and anthropologic research built the world of Gathering Geographies – an exhibition at Darren Knight Gallery curated by Mara Schwerdtfeger in 2022. The collection of works questioned how the Earth's movements – weather, time, resources – shape how we gather, act, and move through space, in turn influencing our creativity and history.
Illustrated throughout.
Artists : Arini Byng, Jessie Gall, and Rebecca Jensen (VIC), Marianna Ebersoll (NSW), Lisa Lerkenfeldt (NSW), Nina Nowak (DE / PL), oceanfloor.group (DK), Mara Schwerdtfeger (NSW), Heather Shannon (NSW), Mardi Reardon-Smith (QLD), Lydia Trappenberg (DE). The exhibition reader features essays from Mara Schwerdtfeger, Marianna Ebersoll, and Sally Molloy alongside poetry from Jess Gall, Maira Wilkie, and oceanfloor.group and a score for solo piano by Heather Shannon.
Hand-numbered edition of 50 copies.
2023, English
Softcover, 376 pages, 20.5 x 15 cm
Published by
No Place Press / US
$55.00 - In stock -
Essays and reminiscences by one of the preeminent art historians of our time, spanning more than four decades.
An Oblique Autobiography assembles a new collection of essays and reminiscences by one of the preeminent art historians of our time. Spanning more than four decades of Yve-Alain Bois's work as a scholar, journal editor, and occasional curator, this volume traces a deeply personal itinerary through an important era of art history, in which the discipline—in part occasioned by Bois's own journey from France to the United States—was significantly reformulated by new methodologies.
Detailing Bois's early relationships with figures such as Roland Barthes, Hubert Damisch, Lygia Clark, and Jacques Derrida, as well as his extended engagements with Rosalind Krauss, Ellsworth Kelly, and Martin Barré, these essays track Bois's intellectual commitments against the backdrop of an evolving academic field. With texts that range from academic journal articles to obituaries, written from 1976 to 2021, An Oblique Autobiography reveals the range of Bois's authorial voice and offers a remarkable self-portrait of one of art history's primary protagonists.
2023, English
Hardcover, 275 pages, 24.8 x 17.2 cm
Published by
Power Publications / Sydney
$40.00 - In stock -
UnAustralian Art: Ten Essays on Transnational Art History proposes a radical rethinking of Australian art. Rather than identifying a national sensibility, Rex Butler and ADS Donaldson demonstrate that Australian art and artists have always been engaged in struggles and creative exchanges with the rest of the world. Examining Australian art as much from the outside in as the inside out, Butler and Donaldson’s methods open Australian art history to an encyclopaedic multitude of hitherto excluded stories.
“This long-awaited volume is a true polemic. Its controversial arguments are squarely aimed at the practices of art museums, art historians and curators. The globalising of art in the current era requires such audacious rewriting of cultural exchanges.”—Ann Stephen, Senior Curator, Art, University of Sydney
“This book raises an important matter for artists subjected to a myopic nationalism in the arts. By proposing an ‘unAustralian art’, Butler and Donaldson show what and who is revealed with a hybrid concept of culture.”—Juan Davila
“Though its temporal and geographic scope is limited to twentieth-century Australian art, UnAustralian Art offers a striking and original model of art historiography for the global contemporary. Butler and Donaldson both critique national art history and present a new account of art on the continent now called ‘Australia’. Against ‘isolationist’ histories of national art, this is a story of connections: between artists, curators, galleries, and museums, between cities and countries. There is a political point at stake here. Reclaiming the term ‘unAustralian’ from the conservative former prime minister John Howard, who popularised it as a pejorative in the 1990s, Butler and Donaldson seek to open, not seal, Australia’s highly politicised borders.”—Helen Hughes, Monash University
2023, English
Softcover, 346 pages, 24.8 x 17.2 cm
Published by
Power Publications / Sydney
$40.00 - Out of stock
Contemporary art begins where painting ends, or so goes one of recent art history's most dominant narratives. This book is a post-mortem of the supposed death of painting in the period following World War II. In eleven essays by a global array of leading scholars, Ends of Painting offers a counter-history, showing how the practice and discourse of painting remained integral to art throughout the 1960s and 1970s.
Written by art historians from Australia, Asia, Europe and North America, each chapter captures a renewed critical approach to topics as diverse as conceptualism and anachronism, photography and autobiography, theatre and politics, nationalism and consumerism, race and modernism.
The book reveals a vast constellation in which painting’s ends are also beginnings—from Warhol’s Cow Wallpaper at the Leo Castelli Gallery in New York to Naoyoshi Hikosaka’s act of pouring latex over tatami mats on his bedroom floor in Tokyo; from the first canvas boards by Aboriginal artists at Papunya in Australia’s Western Desert to the Collective Actions Group’s documentation of people holding up arrangements of coloured envelopes in snowfields outside Moscow.
These unlikely correspondences between times and places sustain this book’s return to the medium, revealing how history is brushed by painting, and painting by history.
2001, English
Softcover, 216 pages, 29.7 x 21 cm
Published by
Power Publications / Sydney
Griffith University / Brisbane
$45.00 - Out of stock
Gordon Bennett: Selected Writings is the first publication to survey the writing practice of the late Gordon Bennett (1955–2014), giving vital insight into one of Australia’s most important contemporary artists in his own words. Bringing together nearly forty published and unpublished essays, artist’s statements, letters, and interviews from across Bennett’s nearly thirty-year career, Selected Writings profiles the importance of the written word within his art and broader intellectual practice. Through its focus on Bennett’s written voice, which shifts between scholarly debate, political argument and personal reflections, this publication reveals Bennett considered art and life to be just as entangled as words and images.
Edited by Angela Goddard and Tim Riley Walsh, Selected Writings is co-published by Power Publications, Sydney, and Griffith University Art Museum, Brisbane. The book also provides glimpses into Bennett’s personal archive via the reproduction of previously unseen notebooks, correspondence, sketches, preparatory compositions, and more. Offering new knowledge of his creative process, intellectual and artistic influences and professional relationships, this project amplifies Bennett’s already significant contribution to subjects of race and identity in national and global contexts, as well as reaffirming his centrality to postcolonial discourse in the twenty-first century.
2011, English
Softcover (die-cut), 140 pages, 26 x 18.5 cm
Published by
Experimental Art Foundation / Adelaide
Yuill—Crowley / Sydney
$50.00 $35.00 - In stock -
The rare published chronology of Australian artist John Barbour’s career beginning with the work; ‘immuredinpace’, (1988), through to his final exhibition held at the yuill|crowley gallery in Sydney, published by Australian Experimental Art Foundation, Adelaide, 2011. Edited by Ewen McDonald. Fully illustrated with essays and bibliographical references.
"Hard/soft, the title of Ewen McDonald's introductory essay, traces the evolution of Barbour's practice from the late 1980s. The book includes insightful essays by Russell Smith, Michael Newall, Ian North and Linda Marie Walker on themes and projects, augmented by an interview with the artist by Anne Thompson ... an acknowledgement and celebration of John Barbour's significant contribution the visual arts over the past few decades. As the essays and reproductions of key works and installations reveal, Barbour is one of Australia's foremost contemporary artists."—Publisher.
As New.
1988, English
Softcover, 156 pages, 21 x 15 cm
$20.00 - Out of stock
The Necessity of Australian Art : An Essay About Interpretation by Ian Burn, Nigel Lendon, Charles Merewether and Ann Stephen critically examines the art historical orthodoxies which have dominated Australian art during the twentieth century.
1996, English
Softcover, 118 pages, 23 x 29.5 cm
Published by
Power Publications / Sydney
Monash University Exhibition Gallery / Victoria
$36.00 - In stock -
Artists Think: The Late Works of Ian Burn explains how it was possible for the artist to return to painting in the late 1980s. Burn, an internationally renowned conceptual artist of the 1960s, had worked for over two decades in alternative cultural practices in Art & Language, New York and later within the Australian trade union movement. His late work, made in a short, intensely productive period before his accidental death in 1993, holds in Burn's words, 'professional spaces and identities hostage to amateur values'. With an introduction and contributing chapter by Ann Stephen, the book contains Burn's essay entitled 'Notes on 'Value Added' Landscapes'. The book also included are a biography and listing of exhibitions of the artist.
Edited by Ann Stephen
Contributors: Ian Burn, Michael Corris, Elizabeth Gertsakis, Helen Grace, Sandy Kirby, Andrew McNamara, Mel Ramsden, Ann Stephen, Paul Wood.
Co-published with Monash University Gallery, Melbourne.
2023, English
Softcover (in sealed cardboard case), 110 pages, 30 x 22 mm
Ed. of 300,
Published by
Guzzler / Rosanna
$50.00 - In stock -
On Display and Questioned : Two exhibitions by Alex Vivian; two interviews with Alex Vivian, 2022, published in a limited edition of 300 copies, each sealed in cardboard mailer. Illustrated throughout with colour plates cataloguing the Victorian exhibitions FIEND? 5–20.12.2020, Guzzler, Rosanna and Porn: squared, hung, drawn, quartered. 11.3–2.4.22, Centre D’editions Melbourne, each accompanied by interviews with artist Alex Vivian by editor and art historian David Homewood. Designed by Alexandra Margetic; photographed by Luke Sands.
Keywords: aid; amyl nitrate; Arial; average gay male (AGM); baseball; bathhouse; condom; cricket; Futura; Genet, Jean; Gerry, Cheesemouth; Golub, Leon; Haring, Keith; Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC); Kruger, Barbara; Lingard, Grant; Melbourne Wankers Club (MWC); Pettibon, Raymond; pornography; rugby; smegma; Treasury Gardens.
2019, English
Softcover, 92 pages, 27 x 18 cm
Published by
Worms / London
$33.00 - In stock -
Worms is a bi-annual literary style magazine that celebrates female/non-binary writer culture.
This inaugural issue, offers a fresh perspective on the accessibility of literature, writers and style. Here, you will find features with Chris Kraus and Ariana Reines about online writing, an exploration into Kathy Acker’s books and influence on contemporary culture, interviews with young upcoming authors and more.
2020, English
Softcover, 92 pages, 27 x 18 cm
Published by
Worms / London
$33.00 - In stock -
Worms is a bi-annual literary style magazine that celebrates female/non-binary writer culture.
Worms 2 the ‘Revolting Women’ issue looks at women who are literally disgusting, figuratively revolting. With a focus on writers who operate on the fringes of literature, ‘revolt' in a Worms context is vast-ranging. This issue includes features with Maggie Nelson, Tilly Lawless, Sarah Schulman, Amelia Abraham, Juliana Huxtable, Juliet Jacques, Olivia Sudjic and more.
2021, English
Softcover, 92 pgs, 27 x 18 cm
Published by
Worms / London
$33.00 - In stock -
Worms is a bi-annual literary style magazine that celebrates female/non-binary writer culture.
Worms 3, the ‘biomythography’ issue, looks at personal myth-making and the stories that shape us.
Featuring Michelle Tea, Moyra Davey, Lynne Tillman, Johanna Hedva, Jenny Hval, Ellen van Neervan, Caroline Calloway, Julie Enszerl and more.
2021, English
Softcover, 92 pages, 27 x 18 cm
Published by
Worms / London
$33.00 - In stock -
Worms 4 looks at psychogeography and the Situationists from a non-male perspective. Taking flâneuserie and the creative benefits of a good walk as its starting point, the issue features conversations with Eileen Myles, Alison Bechdel, Lauren Elkin, Tilly Lawless, Mckenzie Wark, Therese Estacion and Carmen Winant. 2021 was a fraught year for walking; the pandemic restricted our right to movement, while the murders of women walking in London led us to ask the question: how can the act of walking the streets spark political conversation?
2022, English
Softcover, 92 pages, 27 x 18 cm
Published by
Worms / London
$33.00 $15.00 - In stock -
Worms is a bi-annual literary style magazine that celebrates female/non-binary writer culture.
"In this issue, we explore New Narrative alongside writers working today that incorporate some of it’s themes. Our cover star Saidiya Hartman talks with Rhea Dillon about the limits and processes of creating stories from the archive, while Camille Roy and Dodie Bellamy give us insight into New Narrative from their experiences involved in the movement. Savannah Knoop tells us about her life playing the character of J.T Leroy, while Calla Henkel delves into ideas of using other people’s narratives as our own. There’s lots of gleaning, lots of stealing and lots of hard truths coming from the human body. We have poetry and fiction and all of the usual bits, as well as an experimental cut up piece demonstrating the appropriation method that Kathy Acker (via William Burroughs) used in so much of her work. Many more worms to be found in these pages."
2023, English
Softcover, 92 pages, 27 x 18 cm
Published by
Worms / London
$33.00 - In stock -
Worms is a bi-annual literary style magazine that celebrates female/non-binary writer culture.
"The themes of this issue are broad and sprawling. We look at humour, collage, and honesty - finding what’s relatable in the literature we love, and uncovering what it tells us about the present moment. Sheena Patel, our cover star, delves into the internet in all its darkness and hilarity, Elvia Wilk discusses the climate crisis and finding truth in fiction, and Chris Kraus and Ann Rower chat about everything from their influences to what a ‘career’ means as a writer. From Cosey Fanni Tutti to Lola Olufemi to Isabel Waidner, there are many more Worms to be found in these pages."
Featuring: Sheena Patel, Nada Alic, Cosey Fanni Tutti, Elvia Wilk, Ann Rower, Chris Kraus, Ghislaine Leung, Yelena Moskovich, Lola Olufemi, Sam Moore, Isabel Waidner, Cecilia Pavón, Ear Worms X Late Works
Contributors: Haydée Touitou, Nicole Della Costa, Zara Joan Miller, Erin Taylor, Jess Cole, Arcadia Molinas, Phoenix Losavio, Hope Roalfe, Hannah Pezzack, Chris Carter, Clem Macleod, Caitlin Mcloughlin, Isabel Maccarthy, Samantha Rosenwald, Elvira Garcia, Celestine Cooney, Bug Shepherd-Barron, Mary Watt, Delia Rainey
Founder & Editor In Chief: Clem Macleod; Managing Editor: Caitlin Mcloughlin; Art Direction And Design: Caitlin Mcloughlin; Features Editors: Pierce Eldridge, Arcadia Molinas; Contributing Editor: Violet Conroy
2023, English
Softcover, 80 pages, 11.2 x 17.8 cm
Published by
Silver Press / London
$33.00 - In stock -
This audacious manifesto draws on the legacies of bell hooks, Audre Lorde, Angela Davis and others to consider the ways in which Black women have been excluded from, struggled to achieve and opted to reject the category of ‘human’. Sociologist Akwugo Emejulu argues that it is only through embracing the status of the ‘fugitive’ that Black women can determine their own liberation. This title is a call for the collective process of speculative dialogue and a bold new model for action.
Humanity has always excluded Others on the basis of race and gender. What happens to people who choose to flee, following in the footsteps of those who resisted enslavement?