Ben Vautier - Unoriginal Sins

25 Mar BEN VAUTIER. CHRISTIAN BOLTANSKI. JEAN LE GAC. JOHN C. FERNIE. 1972.

Posted at 15:29h in EXHIBITION CATALOGUES

Luzern: Kunstmuseum Luzern, 1972 30 x21cm, unpaginated (c. 300pp) plus card covers. Exhibition catalogue which covers four solo shows including Boltanski alongside Ben, Le Gac and Fernie. Each artist has a section for their own works - Boltanski's reprints Reconstitution de Gestes Effectues par Christian Boltanski and Album de Photo de la Famille D. 19390 - 1965 consisting of 138 found photographs which Boltanski organised into a family album. Texts in French. Mild colouration of white card covers else VG+. Scarce. ...

08 May CHRISTIAN BOLTANSKI MONTRANT L’EMPLACEMENT OU SE TROUVAIT SON LIT ENTRE 1948 ET 1953. 1971. IN NEW ETER NR 2.

Posted at 19:32h in ARTIST’S BOOKS

Malmo: New Eter, 1971
29 x 23cm, printed envelope content of five internal loose sheets -- each 27 x 21.5. 1pp. The Boltanski contribution is a printed offset image of the adult artist bending over showing here his bed was situated in his room for the first nine years of this life.
Other sheets have original contributions by Paul-Armand Gette (Photograph of a tree stump and its exact location), le Gac - a written text, and Ben Vautier - an original found photograph of women practicing fencing which is stamped Ben Vautier certifies this to be a work of Flux Art (each copy had a different photograph). The final sheet is a colophon with a business card stapled to the card sheet and nothing else.
All fine although there is a slight mark from the staple on the colophon on Boltanski's contribution - all in VG+ envelope. A scarce item. Reference: Flay Boltanski Catalogue Page 54.

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14 Nov BOLTANSKI. 1970. ARTIST’S THIRD ONLY SOLO EXHIBITION – HERE AT BEN VAUTIER’S GALLERY.

Posted at 16:31h in EPHEMERA

Nice: Ben Doute de Tout, 1970
10.5 x 15cm, 1pp typographic announcement card which is also a conceptual work in itself. A series of adjectives are posed as questions about Boltanski and the exhibition. Words such as "Maniac?", "Pretentious?", "Sadistic?", "New?" in advance of the exhibition references doubt about whether the artist is pretending to be something/someone else and if his work is genuine? Ben's gallery was called in translation "Ben doubts everything" - and this rather matches that distrust of art and the world. Very scarce early card. VG+.

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10 Oct WORK IN PROGRESS. 1968. ORIGINAL BOLTANSKI CONTRIBUTION NOT IN ANY CATALOGUE RAISONNE.

Posted at 18:05h in ARTIST’S BOOKS

Paris: American Center for Students and Artists, October 1969
18 x 28cm, 42pp (mostly printed one side only) plus rubber stamped card covers. Slide binder. The first edition of an assemblage group artist's book with original contributions by Boltanski, Paul-Armand Gette, Jean Le Gac (here Le Gag!), Gine Pane, Ben Vautier, Andre Cadere, Alain Kirili, and Eric Dietman as well as others.
Boltanski's work is a photograph and text showing a supposed 13 of 1,000 roses planted at the American centre on 9th of October 1969 by Boltanski, the other 987, it is claimed, will be planted in Dijon on 20th of November 1969. These claims are probably spurious.
The other contributions are significant and some copies were signed and numbered by Dietman but this is not one of them.
This example is in very good condition and the book is very rare. It is not mentioned to our knowledge in any Boltanski catalogue raisonne.

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