Book Launch: ‘6 Years: The Collection’
27 June – 25 July 2009
Shashin Art bookshop, Amsterdam
6 YEARS: THE COLLECTION. This exhibition, curated by the artist Emily Williams, will bring the Publications Project released over the last six years together for the first time.
The Publications Project is a collection of artists publications issued by the Dutch Art Institute (DAI) and designed in collaboration with the Werkplaats Typografie (both master programmes of the ArtEZ Institute of the Arts). It is a platform that aims to address the specific process of artist books production, from concept and design to distribution. Since 2003, designers from the Werkplaats Typografie and artists from DAI are invited to team up in couples and develop one project, in close collaboration with an author. The collection was directed by various editors over the last years (Joke Robaard 2006, Maureen Mooren 2007, Emily Pethick 2008). The 2009 edition consists of sixteen publications edited by artist and curator Delphine Bedel. The format of this diverse collection varies from magazine, essays, books, playing cards & artist editions to performance artefacts. Through very diverse perspectives and practices the artists and designers reflect on publishing as a versatile medium.
Expanding on the reflection upon modes of distribution of artist books, the exhibition 6 YEARS: THE COLLECTION at Shashin Art bookshop places the collection directly in the context of other possible circulation for a publication.
The basement of Shashin’s Art bookshop will function as a transitory space where the trajectory of the publications can be intersected, viewed and interacted with. Visitors to the exhibition are invited to send publications to the address of their choice. A chosen publication can be left in a provided envelope and addressed (as a gift) to a receiver. All the envelopes compiled during the one month exhibition will be sent to the addresses written on the envelopes. The artists of the publications projects were asked by Emily Williams, on whose or which bookshelf they would like their publications to arrive. An example of their answers were: on top of the first space shuttle to land on the moon: Apollo 8” and “to the little boy one of the authors once was 20 years ago”. By considering a publication through the imagined destination given to it by its author, a new perspective is opened on the content of the publication. This approach was inspired by reconsidering conventional categorization and
ordering of libraries.
Shashin Art Bookshop
1ste C. Huygenstraat 19, NL-1054 BP Amsterdam. +31 (0)6 20592744
The Goethe Institute, Amsterdam as well as the Stokroos Foundation, Utrecht have each kindly supported one of the 2009 publication. Editor of the Publications Project 2009: Delphine Bedel. Photo credit: Emily Williams & Nikos Doulos, taken from an original Ex-libris Paulo José Pires Brandão. Design: Joris van Aken
* The Dutch Art Institute (DAI) is an MFA program that provides emerging artists with an international platform for exchange, collaboration and dialogue with peers as well as with established practitioners and theoreticians.
www.dutchartinstitute.nl