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
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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.
2018, English / German
Softcover, 176 pages, 21.5 x 27 cm
Published by
Mumok / Vienna
Walther König / Köln
$49.00 - Out of stock
Gaby and Wilhelm Schürmann do not see their collection as just private property or a prestige object, but rather as an item of cultural value that needs exchange with the public. Their collection has been constantly growing since the late 1970s, and it provides an incomparable view of the development of contemporary art from the 1980s onward. This is a progressive statement on behalf of contemporary art that is anchored in social issues and sees itself as a form of communication. The rationale behind the collection, which is held in Herzogenrath near Aachen and in Berlin, is both creative and productive, and the two collectors’ practice can be described as a particularly free-spirited form of cultural production. The act of collecting is realized less in the processes of keeping and completing artworks and is instead understood mainly as an invitation to participate in the public production of connections. This very pragmatic and hands-on approach is manifested in sensual and unconventional gestures of presenting, including the principle of “comparative seeing.” In this sense, the Class Reunion exhibition, the title of which refers to a 2008 installation of the same name by Berlin artist Nairy Baghramian, will unravel an exciting, humorous, and surprising dialogue between the diverse artistic positions in the collection, establishing unexpected points of contact. One focus in this is on Viennese influences on this international collection and its networks.
This book has been published to document the collection on the occasion of an exhibition curated by Wilhelm Schürmann at Mumok, Vienna, June 23, 2018 - November 11, 2018.
Edited by Karola Kraus and illustrated throughout in colour, with accompanying texts and full collection catalogue.
Participating artists:
Nairy Baghramian, Silvia Bächli, Monika Baer, John Baldessari/Meg Cranston, Francesco Barocco, Jennifer Bornstein, Nicola Brunnhuber, Ernst Caramelle, Kate Davis, Heinrich Dunst, Marina Faust, Morgan Fisher, Jef Geys, Ralph Gibson, Julian Göthe, Trixi Groiss, Gerhard Gronefeld, Julia Haller, Rachel Harrison, Lone Haugaard Madsen, Georg Herold, Nicolas Jasmin, Raimer Jochims, Mike Kelley, , Martin Kippenberger, Silke Otto Knapp, Alwin Lay, Brandon Lattu, Michael Light, Sonia Leimer, Anita Leisz, Jochen Lempert, Zoe Leonard, Chris Martin, Park McArthur, Paul McCarthy, Meuser, Lisette Model, Oswald Oberhuber, Albert Oehlen, Anna Oppermann, Anna Ostoya, Jens Preusse, Rebecca Quaytman, Susanne Paesler, Laurie Parsons, Stephen Prina, Deborah Remington, Lin May Saeed, Pentti Sammallahti, Stefan Sandner, Arlene Shechet, Sigune Siévi, Michael Simpson, Michael E. Smith, Lewis Stein, Jana Sterbark, Esther Stocker, Walter Swennen, Alice Tippit, Joëlle Tuerlinckx, Nora Turato, Anne-Mie Van Kerckhoven, Miriam Visaczki, Franz West, Tristan Wilczek, Christopher Williams, Heimo Zobernig
2018, English
Softcover, 94 pages, 23 x 26.4 cm
Published by
Matthew Marks / New York
$50.00 - Out of stock
Suellen Rocca (born 1943) is perhaps best known for the work she made as a member of the Hairy Who, a group of six Chicago artists who exhibited together from 1966 to 1969. This book presents, for the first time, 30 works on paper made between 1981 and 2017. Building on the unique graphic vocabulary and innovative compositions of her 1960s work, these drawings represent a turn toward imagery she describes as "more internal." Animals, trees and unclassifiable creatures are placed in densely patterned settings that carry a genuine emotional charge.
In the book’s essay, Cat Kron notes Rocca’s "increased attention to the unconcious," tracing parallels between the artist’s "anxious imaginings" and the automatic drawing of the Surrealists. As Rocca puts it, "I just begin, and the drawing is a journey between me and the marks on the paper."
2018, English
Hardcover (w. dust jacket), 356 pages, 22.8 x 26.8 cm
Published by
Walther König / Köln
MoMA / New York
$140.00 - Out of stock
With a magician’s sleight of hand, Nauman’s art makes disappearance visible.
At 76 years old, Bruce Nauman is widely acknowledged as a central figure in contemporary art whose stringent questioning of values such as good and bad remains urgent today. Throughout his 50-year career, he has explored how mutable experiences of time, space, sound, movement and language provide an insecure foundation for our understanding of our place in the world.
This richly illustrated catalog offers a comprehensive view of Nauman’s work in all mediums, spanning drawings across the decades; early fiberglass sculptures; sound environments; architecturally scaled, participatory constructions; rhythmically blinking neons; and the most recent 3D video that harks back to one of his earliest performances. A wide range of authors—curators, artists and historians of art, architecture and film—focus on topics that have been largely neglected, such as the architectural models that posit real or imaginary sites as models for ethical inquiry and mechanisms of control. An introductory essay explores Nauman’s many acts of disappearance, withdrawal and deflection as central formal and intellectual concerns. The 18 other contributions discuss individual objects or themes that persist throughout the artist’s career, including the first extensive essay on Nauman as a photographer and the first detailed treatment on the role of color in his work. A narrative exhibition history traces his reception, and features a number of rare or previously unpublished images.
Edited by Kathy Halbreich, Isabel Friedli, Heidi Naef, Magnus Schaefer, Taylor Walsh.
Text by Thomas Beard, Briony Fer, Nicolás Guagnini, Kathy Halbreich, Rachel Harrison, Ute Holl, Suzanne Hudson, Julia Keller, Liz Kotz, Ralph Lemon, Glenn Ligon, Catherine Lord, Roxana Marcoci, Magnus Schaefer, Felicity Scott, Martina Venanzoni, Taylor Walsh, Jeffrey Weiss.
Bruce Nauman was born in Indiana in 1941 and raised near Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He studied math, music and physics at the University of Wisconsin–Madison before switching his major to visual art, and received an MA in sculpture from the University of California, Davis, in 1966. In 1979 he moved to New Mexico, where he continues to reside. Nauman’s work has been the subject of two previous retrospectives, in 1972 and 1994. In 2009 he represented the United States at the Venice Biennale, where he won the Golden Lion.
1985, English
Softcover, 224 pages, 24.5 x 19 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / good
Published by
Jonathan Cape / London
$50.00 - Out of stock
First edition of the great "Testament" book by Tomi Ungerer, published in 1985 to coincide with a major retrospective exhibition in London of one of the world's most famous graphic artists. This volume presents an exceptional collection of Ungerer's satirical drawings spanning 1960 to 1980. From his Underground Sketchbook, The Party, Compromises, politrics, Babylon, Symptomatics, and Rigor Mortis.
"From Tomi Ungerer we can expect the unexpected. Testament - which spans twenty years of his enormously successful career - is filled with surprises. Familiar images are re-assessed from new angles: the improbable, the sinister, the macabre. This is Tomi Ungerer's vision - it is also his
genius. With a fearless eye this master of satire and the absurd pinpoints those areas of our society which we may wish to ignore, and translates his observations into images of immediacy and startling boldness. Ungerer is relentless in exposing human behaviour, as each powerful image cuts through surface appearances to reveal black humour in the underlying realities. From the needless horrors of war and the glorification of violence, through sophisticated pretensions and pomposity, to the little man, often isolated, whose ridiculous actions - tinged with heavy satire - may evoke pathos, nothing
and no one is exempt from Ungerer's dark and biting humour. Newsweek has aptly said of Ungerer's startling graphic commentaries, 'they thud into the solar plexus and stab the intellect'. They are also very funny. This collection is as thought-provoking as it is entertaining. Above all, it is a testament
to the inexhaustible wit and imaginative skill of Tomi Ungerer."
Tomi Ungerer (born 28 November 1931) is an award winning French illustrator and a writer in three languages. He has published over 140 books ranging from much loved children's books to controversial adult work and from the fantastic to the autobiographical. He is known for sharp social satire and witty aphorisms. He is renowned for his iconic Advertising campaigns and political posters against the Vietnam War and Racial Injustice which were representative of the burgeoning political consciousness in New York in the 1960’s. His political engagement has continued to this day in campaigns against Racism and Fascism, for Nuclear disarmament, Ecology and numerous Humanitarian causes.
Good copy, light wear to cover, spotting to title page. Clean, tight copy throughout.
2018, English
Softcover (staple-bound), 24 pages, 13 x 19 cm
Ed. of 150,
Published by
Innen Books / Zürich
$14.00 - In stock -
Limited edition publication dedicated to the unfinished drawings of Los Angeles artist Jason Brinkerhof, published in 2018 by Innen Books in Zürich in an edition of 150 copies only.
2017, English
Softcover (staple-bound), 24 pages, 13 x 19 cm
Edition of 100
Published by
Innen Books / Zürich
$14.00 - In stock -
"Selected Works from 1950 - 1970" is a limited edition publication dedicated to the work of German spiritualist/artist Agatha Wojciechowsky, published in 2017 by Innen Books in Zürich in an edition of 100 copies only.
Agatha Wojciechowsky was recognized during her lifetime as a Surrealist. Although not following an art movement, her work reflected the sentiment of Art Informel of the 1950's. She lived her earlier years in Steinach de Saale, and then sailed to the United States in 1923 to be a German-speaking governess in a German baron's household. She married, became a US citizen and moved to New York City. A well-known Spiritualist medium, Agatha traveled internationally as a healer. In the early 1950's, without any background or training in the arts, Agatha began drawing. First, letters and automatic writing appeared, and then abstract drawings and faces.
"This is the work of different entities who take over and step into my body, directing my hand. I really have nothing to do with it."
Agatha Wociechowsky, along with many other artists of the post war era, was reaching for something timeless, in the spiritual realm. Her work is the expression of that quest.
She had solo exhibitions from the 1960's to the present in New York, Cologne, Berlin, and Hamburg. Group exhibitions included shows with Man Ray, Marcel Duchamp, Jean Dubuffet, Isamu Noguchi, Francis Picabia, Romare Bearden. Her artwork can be found in numerous public collections including Museum of Modern Art, the Prado, the Menil Collection, the Art Institute of Chicago, and the Whitney Museum.
2017, English
Softcover (staple-bound), 20 pages, 13 x 19 cm
Edition of 100
Published by
Innen Books / Zürich
$14.00 - Out of stock
Limited edition publication dedicated to the drawings of Sanya Kantarovsky, published in 2017 by Innen Books in Zürich in an edition of 100 copies only, on the occasion of Printed Matter’s New York Art Book Fair at MoMA PS1 September 22 - 24, 2017.
Sanya Kantarovsky (born in Moscow, Russia in 1982 and currently lives and works in New York) is known for his work across a variety of mediums, as well as his texts and curatorial projects. His multifaceted approach often results in artworks that seem forced to reckon with their own embarrassment. The dark humor consistent in Kantarovsky’s work pits the sumptuous against the abject and thrusts private space – be it physical or psychological – into public view. Kantarovsky’s most well known body of work, his figurative paintings, contains drastic shifts in scale, paint application and stylization. Evoking the feeling of an uneasy inner monologue, figures are gawked at, exposed, poked, or spooned medicine. They interact with one another, as well as the edges of the canvas itself, testing the confines of their given bodies and their given frame. Similarly, Kantarovsky probes his art historical predecessors: both canonical and relatively unknown painters, writers and illustrators. The presence of these muses, which dot Kantarovsky’s compositions simultaneously questions and indulges in a lineage of painterly impulses.
1981, English
Softcover, 144 pages, 18 x 24 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / good
Published by
The Tate Gallery / London
$45.00 - Out of stock
Long out of print catalogue published to accompany the exhibition of David Jones’ paintings, drawings, inscriptions, and a selection of engravings and boxwood carvings at the Tate in 1981. Walter David Jones (known as David Jones, 1895 – 1974) was both a painter and one of the first-generation British modernist poets. As a painter he worked chiefly in watercolour, painting portraits and animal, landscape, legendary and religious subjects. He was also a wood-engraver and designer of inscriptions. As a writer, Jones' In Parenthesis, published in 1937, was hailed by T.S. Eliot as 'a work of genius.' He received similar approbation throughout his career from W.B. Yeats, W.H. Auden, Stephen Spender, Hugh McDiarmid, Kathleen Raine, R.S. Thomas, Evelyn Waugh, Seamus Heaney, Igor Stravinsky and many others. Throughout the 1920s, he trained with the artisans of the Guild of St. Joseph and St. Dominic, an experimental Roman Catholic artist community founded on the principles of Distributism, at Ditchling, Sussex and headed by Eric Gill and others. He himself converted to Catholicism in 1921, and the Catholic 'mythos,' as he termed it, (particularly the Catholic Mass) also became a profound source of inspiration for his art and thinking. Although impeded by several nervous breakdowns in the 30s and 40s, Jones pursued a life totally dedicated to painting and writing. Although engaged once and deeply in love several times, Jones never married. For most of his adult life, he lived alone in various locations in London and Sussex, usually in a single room in a boarding house, but surrounded by a joyful chaos of artworks, artist tools, books, papers and few other possessions.
Illustrated throughout with full catalogue, chronology, essays and bibliography.
Good clean copy, light wear/creasing.
1985, German
Softcover, 213 pages, 22.5 x 30 cm
1st edition, Out of print title / used*,
Published by
Prestel / Munich
$58.00 - Out of stock
Major monograph on the work of Konrad Klapheck published in 1985 by Prestel in Munich. Profusely illustrated throughout in colour and black and white with Klapheck's paintings, drawings and graphic work, accompanied by essays by Werner Hofmann and Peter-Klaus Schuster (in German), and full biography and bibliography.
From the contents: Werner Hofmann: eloquent stupidity or the melancholy of the clichés / Peter-Klaus Schuster: about big and small with Klapheck / Konrad Klapheck: Why I paint; About my drawings / catalog: 1955-1959 The creation of a vocabulary - the main themes in their first versions / 1959-1963 Simplification and stylization / 1963-1973 Return to the banal subject - enhancement and monumentalization / 1973-1985 Development of a composting principle - discovery of the drawing.
Konrad Klapheck (born February 10, 1935) is a German painter and graphic artist whose style of painting combines features of Surrealism and Pop art. Klapheck's works of the mid-1950s are in a magic realist style that became more idiosyncratic when he painted the first of his famous typewriters. His subsequent paintings, often large in scale, are precise and seemingly realistic depictions of technical equipment, machinery and everyday objects, but strangely alienated; they are "monumental, amusingly absurd and sexually suggestive". Klapheck's subjects through the years have included (in order of introduction) typewriters, sewing machines, water taps and showers, telephones, irons, shoes, keys, saws, car tires, bicycle bells and clocks. Influenced by Duchamp, Man Ray, and Max Ernst, Klapheck's "ironic treatment of everyday mechanics" prefigures Pop art in its magnification of the trivial. He became a professor at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf in 1979.
2017, English
Softcover, 120 pages, 25 x 18 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
Koenig Books / London
$120.00 - Out of stock
Now out of print and very collectable, this unique volume contains the last abstract images series made by Hilma af Klint in the 1920ʼs which are previously unpublished in their entirety. These images are followed by ground breaking essays which shed new light on the pioneering abstract artist af Klint and her importance for artists today. These images are complemented by essays based on lectures delivered during the exhibition Hilma af Klint: Painting the Unseen, at London’s Serpentine Galleries in 2016. Briony Fer, David Lomas, Branden Joseph, Hans Ulrich Obrist and Daniel Birnbaum shed new light on af Klint and her importance for artists today, also addressing the need for a broader conception of art history that her work proposes.
Hilma af Klint (1862 – 1944) was a Swedish artist and mystic whose paintings were amongst the first abstract art. A considerable body of her abstract work predates the first purely abstract compositions by Kandinsky. She belonged to a group called "The Five", a circle of women who shared her belief in the importance of trying to make contact with the so-called "High Masters" – often by way of séances. Her paintings, which sometimes resemble diagrams, were a visual representation of complex spiritual ideas.
2012, English
Softcover, 486 pages, 17 x 23 cm
Published by
The MIT Press / Massachusetts
$70.00 - Out of stock
Poet, painter, self-described funny guy, idiot, failure, pickpocket, and anti-artist par excellence, Francis Picabia was a defining figure in the Dada movement; indeed, Andre Breton called Picabia one of the only "true" Dadas. Yet very little of Picabia's poetry and prose has been translated into English, and his literary experiments have never been the subject of close critical study. I Am a Beautiful Monster is the first definitive edition in English of Picabia's writings, gathering a sizable array of Picabia's poetry and prose and, most importantly, providing a critical context for it with an extensive introduction and detailed notes by the translator. Picabia's poetry and prose is belligerent, abstract, polemical, radical, and sometimes simply baffling. For too long, Picabia's writings have been presented as raw events, rule-breaking manifestations of inspirational carpe diem. This book reveals them to be something entirely different: maddening in their resistance to meaning, full of outrageous posturing, and hiding a frail, confused, and fitful personality behind egoistic bravura.
I Am a Beautiful Monster provides the texts of of Picabia's significant publications, all presented complete, many of them accompanied by their original illustrations.
1980, French / German
Softcover, 140 pages, 19 x 15.5 cm
Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
Diogenes / Zürich
$30.00 - Out of stock
“Toxicologie” by the great French illustrator, author, humorist, satirist, play-write, actor, poet, painter, performer, sculptor, Roland Topor (1938–1997) was first published in 1970 and forms one of the classic collections of the absurdist, surrealistic illustrations he is so well known for.
Preface by fellow Mouvement Panique member Fernando Arrabal and postface by French poet Jacques Prévert.
1980 softcover edition published by Diogenes in Zürich.
Roland Topor was one of the most unique and versatile French artists of the second half of the 20th century, working prolifically as a provocative and spirited illustrator, author, humorist, satirist, play-write, actor, poet, painter, performer, sculptor, and much more. Son of a Parisian painter and sculptor of Polish-Jewish descent, in 1941, Topor's father was arrested and sent to camp Pithiviers. Two years later, the family moved to Savoy, where they baptised their son to hide his real identity. After the war, he studied art at the Institute of Beaux-Arts in Paris. He discovered surrealism, Hieronymus Bosch and the scatological plays of Alfred Jarry, which would influence his work and his attitude to life in general.
In 1958, he published his first work in magazines such as Bizarre and later Elle. Three years later, he joined the anarchic group of artists who created the controversial magazine Hara-Kiri, publishing his surreal juxtapositions of people, animals, plants and objects. Topor seldom used words in his illustrations, leaving all power to the visual. In February 1962, Topor, Alejandro Jodorowsky, Olivier O. Olivier, Jacques Sternberg, Christian Zeimert, Abel Ogier and Fernando Arrabal founded the "Mouvement Panique" ("Panic Movement"). This collective focused on creating absurd and bewildering performances to reject the commercialization of surrealism. The founders created many provocative and surreal works in the next decade before Jodorowsky dissolved the movement in 1973. However, Topor continued making scandalous plays afterwards, including 'Le Bébé de Monsieur Laurent' (1975) and 'Vinci avait raison' (1976).
In print, Topor's history is legendary. In 1964 Topor published his debut novel 'Le Locataire Chimérique' ('The Tenant', 1964), a psychological horror story about a man moving in an apartment where he is gradually pestered into madness by the other inhabitants. The work was adapted to film in 1976 by Roman Polanski and both the book as well as the picture are cult classics to this day. His 1980s pamphlet '100 Bonnes Raisons Pour Me Suicider' ('100 Good Reasons To Commit Suicide') is another example of his taste for black comedy. The most unique and unusual book in Topor's oeuvre must be 'Souvenir' (1972), a kind-of Fluxus obscurity featuring a text with all the sentences scratched out to the point of being unreadable. When the artist was interviewed on Dutch television by Adriaan van Dis to read some extracts from it Topor accepted the request by holding his hand in front of his mouth and mumble through it. In 1966 Topor illustrated 'Topographie Anécdotée du Hasard' (Anecdoted Topography of Chance) by Swiss assemblage artist Daniel Spoerri. Following a rambling conversation with his friend Robert Filliou in 1961, Daniel Spoerri one day mapped the objects lying at random on the table in his room, adding a rigorously scientific description of each. These objects subsequently evoked associations, memories and anecdotes from both the original author and his friends Filliou, Emmett Williams, Dieter Roth and Roland Topor. Considered a "quasi-autobiographical tour de force", incredible book was published in 1966 by the Something Else Press in New York City. Topor added sketches of each object. Acknowledged as one of the most important and entertaining artists’ books of the postwar period, An Anecdoted Topography of Chance is a unique collaborative work by four artists associated with the Fluxus and Nouveau Réalisme movements.
Topor also had an interest in film. He designed the posters of movies such as 'L'Ibis Rouge' (1975), 'Ai no borei' ('The Empire of Passion', 1978) and 'Die Blechtrommel' ('The Tin Drum', 1979). His drawings can also be seen during the opening titles of Fernando Arrabal's experimental film 'Viva La Muerte' (1971) and during the magic lantern sequence in Federico Fellini's 'Il Casanova di Fellini' (1976). He also worked as an actor, appearing in Dusan Makavejev's 'Sweet Movie' (1974) and as Dracula's assistant Renfield in Werner Herzog's horror remake of 'Nosferatu' (1979). The latter film has also immortalized his notorious hysterical and chilling laugh.
Together with René Laloux, he created the animated shorts 'Les Temps Morts' (1964) and 'Les Escargots' ('The Snails', 1965) and the full length animated feature 'La Planète Sauvage' ('Fantastic Planet', 1973). The latter work was based on Stefan Wul's science fiction novel 'Oms en Série' and takes place on a surreal planet where gigantic blue aliens treat humans as pets. 'La Planète Sauvage' won the special jury prize at the Festival of Cannes and has achieved cult status over the years.
Topor was a frequent guest in the philosophical radio show 'Des Papous dans la tête' (1984) at France Culture. Together with his good friend and playwright Jean-Michel Ribes, he wrote scripts for the satirical TV sketch series 'Merci Bernard' (1982-1984) on France 3 and 'Palace' (1988-1989) on Canal +. They wrote the theatrical play 'Batailles' (1983) about people of different social classes stranded on a raft, which was a satirical allegory of capitalism. Another collaborative project was the comedy film 'La Galette du Roi' (1985). In 1975 he recorded an album with his Belgian friend Freddy De Vree called 'Panic (The Golden Years)'. It features Topor being interviewed by De Vree on the Flemish public radio channel BRT 3. Apart from talking he also recites some nonsensical songs, including the Dutch nursery rhyme 'Iene miene mutte' and the tongue twister 'De kat krabt de krullen van de trap.' Topor also wrote two songs, 'Je m'aime' and 'Monte dans mon ambulance', which were set to music by François d'Aime and recorded by Japanese singer Megumi Satsu in 1980.
In the 1980s, Topor published in Le Petit Psikopat Illustré, an alternative review, and also teamed up with Belgian film director Henri Xhonneux to create the cult children's series 'Téléchat', a news show featuring anthropomorphic animals and objects and marionets presenting news. The program received various awards, including the 1984 award for best French broadcast for children and adolescents at the Festival of Cannes. It was also nominated for an Emmy in 1985.
Topor and Xhonneux joined forces again in 1989 to create the film 'Marquis', which was loosely based on the life and work of the notorious Marquis de Sade. The actors performed in animal masks and De Sade's penis was made into a separate puppet with a human face and the ability to talk. Due to the unusualness of its execution it became a cult favorite.
Very good copy with light wear.
1993, English / French (Japanese translations as inserted booklet)
Softcover (w. dust jacket and booklet insert), 132 pages, 29 x 22.5 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
Galerie Tokoro / Tokyo
$120.00 - Out of stock
First edition of the scarce and beautifully designed "Mondrian in New York", published by Galerie Tokora in Tokyo, 1993. This heavily researched and profusely illustrated book compiles the exuberant late years of the great Dutch painter Piet Mondrian. His Greenwich Village "Jazz Years". This show was the first of its kind in the world. Mondrian's paintings, sketches, studies, objects, studio, exhibits and surroundings from this period are all captured here in colour and black and white photographs, along with major texts by Christian Derouet and Harry Holtzman. A special feature of the exhibition was the recreation of his 59th St. studio, including his last series of wall compositions, "The Wall Works, 1943-1944", collaged by the artist onto the walls of his studio, alongside his "Three-dimensional Constructions", a series of sculptural studio objects, all documented in this book.
After the devastation of the first First World War, Mondrian and other Dutch artists of the new De Stijl movement would seek to wash away all the tainted and corrupted forms of the past, and create a new language based upon the most basic visual elements. Promoting abstraction in painting, furniture design, and architecture, De Stijl, and other revolutionary art movements of the time, called into question the fundamental viability and wisdom of the long-standing European order. Mondrian's groundbreaking and revolutionary new paintings propelled him to fame in Paris in the interwar years, embraced by the ‘Lost Generation', working prolifically throughout the 1920s-30s.
Escaping the ravages of World War II, Piet Mondrian fled to London, then to New York where he broke new ground in his art. Mondrian delighted in the city's architecture and that great American art form - Jazz, finding its syncopated beat, irreverent approach to melody, and improvisational aesthetic akin to what he called, in his own work, the "destruction of natural appearance; and construction through continuous opposition of pure means—dynamic rhythm." In New York, said Alan Riding in the New York Times, Mondrian finally “freed himself, in his words, ‘from the captivity of black lines.’ In their place came colored lines and even the suggestion of depth…by all accounts, he was also happy in New York, satisfying his passion for jazz in Greenwich Village cafes …” In fact, in spite of the unprecedented devastation taking place in Europe by the Nazis, Mondrian’s paintings displayed a hopefulness and vitality hitherto unseen. Inspired by jazz and spurred onward by the progress of the allies in Europe, Mondrian’s paintings — previously so restrained and disciplined — took on an almost giddy exuberance.
Pieter Cornelis "Piet" Mondriaan, after 1906 Mondrian (1872 – 1944), was a Dutch painter and theoretician who is regarded as one of the greatest artists of the 20th century. Mondrian's art was highly utopian and was concerned with a search for universal values and aesthetics. He is known for being one of the pioneers of 20th century abstract art, as he changed his artistic direction from figurative painting to an increasingly abstract style, until he reached a point where his artistic vocabulary was reduced to simple geometric elements.
Very Good preserved copy with bright dust jacket and original inserted Japanese text booklet. Light edge spotting/discolouration to endpapers only (and internal booklet cover), otherwise a fine copy - clean and bright.
1997, English / Japanese
Hardcover (cardboard box covers w. glued in booklets, fold-outs, inserts), 84 pages plus fold-outs, 12.5 x 14 cm
1st edition, Out of print title / used*,
Published by
Wateri Museum of Contemporary Art / Tokyo
$90.00 - Out of stock
Very scarce Tony Oursler + Mike Kelley exhibition catalogue / artists' book published in conjunction with a major two-person exhibition held 1997 - 1998 in Tokyo. Includes colour installation images of the exhibition as installed at Documenta X, June 21 - September 28, 1997. "The ongoing 'Poetics Project' serves up a rich mix of visual and aural experiences, while inviting viewers to question the reliability of the shows as history. Artist Mike Kelley says, 'If you don't create your own history, someone else will." Kelley and Tony Oursler's the 'Poetics Project 1977-1997' is a retrospective work that draws from their collaborative efforts in painting, video, sculpture, drawing and music. Although the ostensible subject of this project is Kelley and Oursler's early experiences as performers in a loose-knit musical group called the Poetics, its broader concerns are the processes by which history is constructed, and the reciprocal relationship between the fine arts and popular culture. The conflation of past and present in the 'Poetics Project' makes it difficult at first for the viewer to penetrate the work. Video installations and taped interviews with visual artists, rock musicians and critics are intermingled with paintings, sculptures and stacks of drawings. A precise checklist and diagram prepared by Kelley and Oursler methodically pinpoint the authorship of each work, while serving as a serf-guided tour and critical record of the project. Only with this didactic help do viewers come to realize that the 'Poetics Project' is almost entirely made up of works created in 1997 and 1998, though based on what Kelley and Oursler tell us is a single notebook of sketches and a collection of audio recordings--some little more than notations for never-performed works--which date from the late 1970s and early '80s (the Poetics disbanded in 1983). Filled with irony and steeped in serf-reflexive practice, this work builds upon the radical autobiographical prose of William S. Burroughs and art works and performances by artists such as John Baldessari, Allan Kaprow and Andy Warhol. Reminiscent of Warhol's A:A Novel, which records one day in the life of the artist in 384 pages, the 'Poetics Project' is an expanding template of art works which explores how the past can be reconstructed to shed light on the present." -- Diane Shamash, Art in America, October 1998
First and only edition of this unique Japanese publication from these two American artists. Cardboard covers feature decal artwork reproducing the Oursler/Kelley collaborative artwork "Poetics Country", 1997.
2005, English / German
Softcover, 128 pages, 24 x 17 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / good
Published by
Revolver – Archiv für aktuelle Kunst / Frankfurt am Main
$45.00 - Out of stock
Catalogue published to coincide with a large retrospective exhibition of German artist Charlotte Posenenske held at Galerie im Taxispalais, Innsbruck, March 19 - May 15, 2005. Edited by Silvia Eiblmayr and Astrid Wege, and including further texts by Eva Schmidt, Gerald Schröder, Astrid Wege and a conversation between Konstantin Adamopoulos and Burkhard Brunn (in both German and English), this heavily illustrated catalogue follows the exhibitions ambition to present Posenenske’s development over a short span of time, primarily the 1960s, leading from painting to real space. Feature paintings from the late 1950s and early 1960s, Striped Pictures and Three-Dimensional Pictures from the mid-1960s, Reliefs (1967) as well as the Square Tubes that she presented both indoors and outdoors (1967) and her Revolving Vanes (1967/68) – the last group of works Posenenske produced before she gave up art in 1968. Posenenske’s both radical and multi-facetted artistic approach is rounded off by her stage set designs from the 1950s, her art-in-architecture projects from the 1960s and in particular her two film strips from 1968 that were created with the active participation of Peter Roehr and Paul Maenz on a drive through Holland in spring 1968. Also includes list of works and biography.
Charlotte Posenenske (1930–1985) was a German artist associated with the minimalist movement who predominately worked in sculpture, but also produced paintings and works on paper.
Posenenske worked in a variety of mediums, her practice becoming more abstract through the course of the 1960s. While other artists of the period worked in multiples, where a finite edition of a work could be produced, Posenenske worked in series, meaning that there was no limit to the editions. Posenenske rejected the commercial art market, offering her work for sale at its material cost. Reconstructions authorised by the artist’s estate are not replicas, and they are outwardly identical to the original prototype. Only the certificate differentiates the unsigned work from other commodities.
In 1968 Posenenske published a statement in the journal Art International referencing the reproducibility of her works, and her desire for the concept and ownership of the piece to be accessible:
I make series
because I do not want to make individual pieces for individuals,
in order to have elements combinable within a system,
in order to make something that is repeatable, objective,
and because it is economical.
The series can be prototypes for mass-production.
[...]
They are less and less recognisable as "works of art."
The objects are intended to represent anything other than what they are.
Poseneske stopped working as an artist in 1968, no longer believing that art could influence social interaction or draw attention to social inequalities. She retrained as a sociologist and became a specialist in employment and industrial working practices until her death in 1985. During this period of self-imposed exile Posenenske refused to visit any exhibitions, and did not show her work.
1966, English
Softcover, 214 pages, 20.5 x 14 cm
1st US Edition, Out of print title / used / fine
Published by
Something Else Press / New York
$70.00 - Out of stock
First softcover English edition, published in 1966 by Something Else Press, New York, of "An Anecdoted Topography of Chance", arguably the most important and entertaining "Artist's Book" of the post-war period. A unique collaborative work by four artists associated with the FLUXUS and Nouveau Realisme movements, Daniel Spoerri, Robert Filliou, Emmett Williams, and Roland Topor.
What is the Topography? Hard to explain an idea so simple yet so brilliantly executed. Following a rambling conversation with his dear friend Robert Filliou, Daniel Spoerri one day mapped the objects lying at random on the table in his room, adding a rigorously scientific description of each. These objects subsequently evoked associations, memories, anecdotes; not only from the original author, but from his friends as well: a beguiling creation was born. Many of the principal participants of FLUXUS make an appearance (and texts by Higgins, Jouffroy, Kaprow, Restany, and Tinguely are included, among others). It is a novel of digressions in the manner of Tristram Shandy or Robbe-Grillet; it's a game, a poem, an encyclopaedia, a cabinet of wonders: a celebration of friendship and creativity.
The Topography personifies (and pre-dates) the whole FLUXUS spirit and constitutes one of the strangest and most compelling insights into the artist's life. From out of the banal detritus of the everyday a virtual autobiography emerges: of four perceptive, witty and eloquent members of the human species.
Translated from the French and further anecdoted by poet Emmett Williams.
First 1966 softcover edition in As New condition.
Couldn't be more highly recommended.
2015, English
Softcover (staple-bound), 24 pages, 13 x 19 cm
Edition of 100
Published by
Innen Books / Zürich
$14.00 - Out of stock
Melbourne artist Christopher LG Hill's "Dissolve Blur Gap Blue Grape Space", published in an edition of 100 copies by Innen Books, Zürich, in 2015.
Born 1980, Melbourne, Victoria; Christopher LG Hill lives and works in Melbourne. A co-founder of artist-run space Y3K, Hill has participated in, and organised, many exhibitions and music-related events and productions. Hill is editor and publisher of Endless Lonely Planet and co-founder of Bunyip Trax.
2016, English
Softcover (staple-bound), 24 pages, 13 x 19 cm
Edition of 100
Published by
Innen Books / Zürich
$14.00 - In stock -
Melbourne artist Christopher LG Hill's "Bagged Goods", published in an edition of 100 copies by Innen Books, Zürich, in 2016.
Born 1980, Melbourne, Victoria; Christopher LG Hill lives and works in Melbourne. A co-founder of artist-run space Y3K, Hill has participated in, and organised, many exhibitions and music-related events and productions. Hill is editor and publisher of Endless Lonely Planet and co-founder of Bunyip Trax.
1984, German
Softcover, 130 pages, 19 x 12.5 cm
Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
Kiepenheuer & Witsch / Köln
$30.00 - Out of stock
“Les Masochistes” by the great French illustrator, author, humorist, satirist, play-write, actor, poet, painter, performer, sculptor, Roland Topor (1938–1997) was first published in 1960 and features over 100 pages of his absurdly humorous, perverse, masochistic human actions.
1984 edition published by Kiepenheuer & Witsch in Köln.
Roland Topor was one of the most unique and versatile French artists of the second half of the 20th century, working prolifically as a provocative and spirited illustrator, author, humorist, satirist, play-write, actor, poet, painter, performer, sculptor, and much more. Son of a Parisian painter and sculptor of Polish-Jewish descent, in 1941, Topor's father was arrested and sent to camp Pithiviers. Two years later, the family moved to Savoy, where they baptised their son to hide his real identity. After the war, he studied art at the Institute of Beaux-Arts in Paris. He discovered surrealism, Hieronymus Bosch and the scatological plays of Alfred Jarry, which would influence his work and his attitude to life in general.
In 1958, he published his first work in magazines such as Bizarre and later Elle. Three years later, he joined the anarchic group of artists who created the controversial magazine Hara-Kiri, publishing his surreal juxtapositions of people, animals, plants and objects. Topor seldom used words in his illustrations, leaving all power to the visual. In February 1962, Topor, Alejandro Jodorowsky, Olivier O. Olivier, Jacques Sternberg, Christian Zeimert, Abel Ogier and Fernando Arrabal founded the "Mouvement Panique" ("Panic Movement"). This collective focused on creating absurd and bewildering performances to reject the commercialization of surrealism. The founders created many provocative and surreal works in the next decade before Jodorowsky dissolved the movement in 1973. However, Topor continued making scandalous plays afterwards, including 'Le Bébé de Monsieur Laurent' (1975) and 'Vinci avait raison' (1976).
In print, Topor's history is legendary. In 1964 Topor published his debut novel 'Le Locataire Chimérique' ('The Tenant', 1964), a psychological horror story about a man moving in an apartment where he is gradually pestered into madness by the other inhabitants. The work was adapted to film in 1976 by Roman Polanski and both the book as well as the picture are cult classics to this day. His 1980s pamphlet '100 Bonnes Raisons Pour Me Suicider' ('100 Good Reasons To Commit Suicide') is another example of his taste for black comedy. The most unique and unusual book in Topor's oeuvre must be 'Souvenir' (1972), a kind-of Fluxus obscurity featuring a text with all the sentences scratched out to the point of being unreadable. When the artist was interviewed on Dutch television by Adriaan van Dis to read some extracts from it Topor accepted the request by holding his hand in front of his mouth and mumble through it. In 1966 Topor illustrated 'Topographie Anécdotée du Hasard' (Anecdoted Topography of Chance) by Swiss assemblage artist Daniel Spoerri. Following a rambling conversation with his friend Robert Filliou in 1961, Daniel Spoerri one day mapped the objects lying at random on the table in his room, adding a rigorously scientific description of each. These objects subsequently evoked associations, memories and anecdotes from both the original author and his friends Filliou, Emmett Williams, Dieter Roth and Roland Topor. Considered a "quasi-autobiographical tour de force", incredible book was published in 1966 by the Something Else Press in New York City. Topor added sketches of each object. Acknowledged as one of the most important and entertaining artists’ books of the postwar period, An Anecdoted Topography of Chance is a unique collaborative work by four artists associated with the Fluxus and Nouveau Réalisme movements.
Topor also had an interest in film. He designed the posters of movies such as 'L'Ibis Rouge' (1975), 'Ai no borei' ('The Empire of Passion', 1978) and 'Die Blechtrommel' ('The Tin Drum', 1979). His drawings can also be seen during the opening titles of Fernando Arrabal's experimental film 'Viva La Muerte' (1971) and during the magic lantern sequence in Federico Fellini's 'Il Casanova di Fellini' (1976). He also worked as an actor, appearing in Dusan Makavejev's 'Sweet Movie' (1974) and as Dracula's assistant Renfield in Werner Herzog's horror remake of 'Nosferatu' (1979). The latter film has also immortalized his notorious hysterical and chilling laugh.
Together with René Laloux, he created the animated shorts 'Les Temps Morts' (1964) and 'Les Escargots' ('The Snails', 1965) and the full length animated feature 'La Planète Sauvage' ('Fantastic Planet', 1973). The latter work was based on Stefan Wul's science fiction novel 'Oms en Série' and takes place on a surreal planet where gigantic blue aliens treat humans as pets. 'La Planète Sauvage' won the special jury prize at the Festival of Cannes and has achieved cult status over the years.
Topor was a frequent guest in the philosophical radio show 'Des Papous dans la tête' (1984) at France Culture. Together with his good friend and playwright Jean-Michel Ribes, he wrote scripts for the satirical TV sketch series 'Merci Bernard' (1982-1984) on France 3 and 'Palace' (1988-1989) on Canal +. They wrote the theatrical play 'Batailles' (1983) about people of different social classes stranded on a raft, which was a satirical allegory of capitalism. Another collaborative project was the comedy film 'La Galette du Roi' (1985). In 1975 he recorded an album with his Belgian friend Freddy De Vree called 'Panic (The Golden Years)'. It features Topor being interviewed by De Vree on the Flemish public radio channel BRT 3. Apart from talking he also recites some nonsensical songs, including the Dutch nursery rhyme 'Iene miene mutte' and the tongue twister 'De kat krabt de krullen van de trap.' Topor also wrote two songs, 'Je m'aime' and 'Monte dans mon ambulance', which were set to music by François d'Aime and recorded by Japanese singer Megumi Satsu in 1980.
In the 1980s, Topor published in Le Petit Psikopat Illustré, an alternative review, and also teamed up with Belgian film director Henri Xhonneux to create the cult children's series 'Téléchat', a news show featuring anthropomorphic animals and objects and marionets presenting news. The program received various awards, including the 1984 award for best French broadcast for children and adolescents at the Festival of Cannes. It was also nominated for an Emmy in 1985.
Topor and Xhonneux joined forces again in 1989 to create the film 'Marquis', which was loosely based on the life and work of the notorious Marquis de Sade. The actors performed in animal masks and De Sade's penis was made into a separate puppet with a human face and the ability to talk. Due to the unusualness of its execution it became a cult favorite.
Very good copy with tanning to spine and page edges.
2018, English
Softcover (staple-bound, stamped cover), 111 pages, 13.97 x 21.59 cm
Ed. of 100,
Published by
Self-Published
$26.00 - In stock -
Rob Halverson's first artist book is a collection of his various titles, texts, poems, and lists written between 1999 – 2018. Conceived and designed by Halverson the book shares ‘pure text’ removed from any visual works or exhibitions they were previously attached to. These collected writings concern themselves with our sense of the effects of passing time, daily personal narratives, notions of work, and meditations on routine and production.
Rob Halverson (b. 1980), Peru, Illinois, is an artist and curator living and working in Portland, Oregon.
2016, English
Hardcover, 186 pages, 15 x 24 cm
Published by
IMA / Brisbane
Sternberg Press / Berlin
$36.00 - Out of stock
Edited by Aileen Burns, Johan Lundh
Texts by Helen Hughes, Ian McLean, Julie Nagam
Gordon Bennett: Be Polite follows the exhibition of largely unseen works on paper by one of Australia’s most visionary and critical artists, Gordon Bennett (1955–2014). The exhibition and publication are the first to present the work of Bennett since his death. Though rarely seen in exhibition contexts, Bennett’s drawing and writing formed the foundation of his practice.
This publication brings together three newly commissioned essays by art historian Ian McLean and curators and arts writers Helen Hughes and Julie Nagam. The selection of works from the Estate of Gordon Bennett comprises drawings, acrylic/gouache and watercolor paintings, poetry, and essays from the early 1990s to the early 2000s—a period that produced work of remarkable force and revealed the artist’s working methods, research focuses, and ultimately his ambitions for his work.
Copublished with Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane
Design by Žiga Testen
1968, English
Softcover, 448 pages, 20 x 13.5 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / average
$30.00 - Out of stock
Battock's definitive 1968 collection of writings by and about the work of the 1960s minimalists, generously illustrated with photographs of paintings, sculpture, and performance, published by E. P. Dutton & Co. Inc., New York.
A collection of twenty-eight seminal essays by both critics and artists across over 400 pages, analyzing all aspects of Minimal Art at it's height in the late 1960s. Includes Lawrence Alloway (Systemic Painting), Mel Bochner (Serial Art, Systems, Solipsism), David Bourdon (The Razed Sites of Carl Andre), Nicolas Calas (Subject Matter in the Work of Barnett Newman), Bruce Glaser (Questions to Frank Stella and Donald Judd), Lucy R. Lippard (Eros Presumptive), John Perreault (Minimal Abstracts), Irving Sandler (Gesture and Non-Gesture in Recent Sculpture), Peter Hutchinson (Mannerism in the Abstract0, Willoughby Sharp (Luminism and Kineticism), Elayne Varian (Schemata 7), Richard Wollheim (Minimal Art), and texts by Martial Raysse, Michael Fried, Clement Greenberg, Dan Flavin, Robert Smithson, and more.
Heavily illustrated throughout with 170 photographs featuring the work of Sol LeWitt, Lee Bontecou, Donald Judd, Hanne Darboven, Carl Andre, Claes Oldenburg, Yves Klein, Jasper Johns, Robert Rauschenberg, John Chamberlain, Agnes Martin, Christo, Barnett Newman, Ellsworth Kelly, Edward Kienholz, Anne Truitt, Joseph Kosuth, Piet Mondrian, Richard Anuszkiewicz, Marcel Duchamp, Chryssa, Anthony Caro, Dan Flavin, Robert Smithson, Frank Stella, Robert Barry, Larry Bell, Carlo Belloli, William Anastasi, Richard Artschwager, Ronald Balden, John Cage, Walter De Maria, Stephen Antonakos, Walter Darby Bannard, Allan D'Arcangelo, Stuart Davis, Mark di Suvero, Helen Frankenthaler, Jim Dine, Al Held, Dan Graham, Robert Grosvenor, Hans Haacke, Ralph Humphrey, Eva Hesse, Douglas Huebler, Will Insley, Patricia Johanson, Allan Kaprow, Roy Lichtenstein, Morris Louis, Robert Mangold, Brice Marden, Yvonne Rainer, Julio Le Parc, David Smith, Richard Tuttle, Tony Smith, Keith Sonnier, James Raphael Soto, Clyfford Still, Les Levine, Victor Vasarely, Ad Reinhardt, John McCracken, Robert Morris, Kenneth Noland, Robert Whitman, Jules Olitski, Milton Resnick, Michelangelo Pistoletto, Jackson Pollock, Larry Poons, Jack Youngerman, George Rickey, Dorothea Rockburne, James Rosenquist, Edward Ruscha, Jan van Eyck, Andy Warhol, Tom Wesselmann, and many others.
Good with general wear and previous owner underlining / notation. Ex-library.
1980, English
Softcover (stapled), 38 pages, 21.5 x 21.5 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / good
Published by
State Jewish Museum / Prague
$25.00 - Out of stock
Booklet publishing the short history of the experiences of the Czech children imprisoned by the Nazis in the garrison town of Terezín during World War II. The book presents written and illustrated samples of the magazine Vedem, published secretly by young boys, that contained childrens prose and poetry. The book presents paintings, drawings and collages by children from Terezín, depicting the reality of concentration camp life.
Vedem (In the Lead) was a Czech-language literary magazine that existed from 1942 to 1944 in the Terezín concentration camp, during the Holocaust. It was hand-produced by a group of boys living in the Home One barracks, among them editor-in-chief Petr Ginz and Hanuš Hachenburg. Altogether, some 700 pages of Vedem survived World War II. The magazine was written, edited, and illustrated entirely by young boys, aged twelve to fifteen, who lived in Barracks L417, or Home One, which the boys referred to as the Republic of Shkid. Each boy took a nickname to sign his articles. The content of Vedem included poems, essays, jokes, dialogues, literary reviews, stories, and drawings. The boys tried as much as possible to create a real magazine, even jokingly adding a price on the cover. The issues were then copied manually and read around the barracks on Friday night. For some time, it was also posted on the barracks bulletin board, however, it was decided to discontinue this practice because it was deemed dangerous in case of SS inspections. By 1944, most of the inhabitants of Barracks L417 had been deported to the gas chambers of Auschwitz, and no more issues were produced. Of the one hundred boys who participated in the effort to produce Vedem, only about fifteen survived. Only one of them, Zdeněk Taussig, remained in Terezín until its liberation in May 1945. He had hidden it in a blacksmith shop where his father had worked, and brought it back with him to Prague after he was liberated.
Good copy of the only edition.
1983, Japanese
Hardcover (clothbound w. dustjacket), 151 pages, 20.5 x 30 cm
Out of print title / used / very good
Published by
Centre Georges Pompidou / Paris
Editions Filipacchi / Paris
Musee National D'art Moderne / Paris
Orion Press / Tokyo
$170.00 - Out of stock
Rare, exquisitely designed and produced book dedicated entirely to the photography of the German artist Hans Bellmer (13 March 1902 – 23 February 1975), best known for the life-sized pubescent female dolls he produced in the mid-1930s. "Bellmer was born in the city of Kattowitz, then part of the German Empire (now Katowice, Poland). Up until 1926, he'd been working as a draftsman for his own advertising company. He initiated his doll project to oppose the fascism of the Nazi Party by declaring that he would make no work that would support the new German state. Represented by mutated forms and unconventional poses, his dolls were directed specifically at the cult of the perfect body then prominent in Germany. Bellmer was influenced in his choice of art form by reading the published letters of Oskar Kokoschka (Der Fetisch, 1925)."
Produced in French by Editions Filipacchi, Centre Georges Pompidou, and Musee National D'art Moderne in Paris in 1983, this very scarce Japanese printing (produced and printed in Japan that same year) features a different cover, with translations to the Japanese language of the introductory essay and texts. Densely illustrated with amazing and beautifully printed colour and black and white photography of Bellmer's dolls, many studies of the female nude, and photography of objects and sculptural assemblages, this book is a wonderful volume capturing an important Surrealist visionary of our time through his stunning photography.
Very good copy in dust-jacket, age tanning to edges/cover.