22 Sep

Posted at 22:18h in Poems in folders

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1992
15.3 x 11.1cm, 4pp grey outer folder with a drawing of a fallen leaves printed in green. Internally a 15.3 x 11.1cm, 4pp sheet with a poem:

SUICIDE NOTE

"The canoe
of life
is shattered.."

The windblown
willows' leaves
hide the path.

The suicide note referred to is from the Russian avant-garde poet Mayakovsky. The reference to the 'canoe of life is shattered" is a direct quote from his despairing final letter. Finlay brings attention to the shape of the willow leaves that have fallen (shattered by the wind) to the ground. The image on the front of the folder also shows that death of the leaves.

This is one of a series of works which the Wild Hawthorn Press denoted as "Poems in folders". VG+.

...

19 Sep

Posted at 09:45h in ARTIST’S BOOKS

Saint-Gall: Stiftsbibliothek, n.d. (1992)
10.5 x15cm, 8pp (original postcards bound in) plus front and back cards. Artist's book consisting of postcards showing installation views of a small exhibition of books by Boltanski from a library exhibition in the abbey of Saint-Gall. The show consisted of a single vitrine it seems. The images do not really allow one to see the books but the library is clearly impressive. The installation was organised by Hans Ulrich Obrist but he claims elsewhere his first curated exhibition was one year later (which also included Boltanski).
Reference: Calle Boltanski Artist's Books Page 76.

...

16 Aug

Posted at 12:14h in Artist's Postcards

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1992
8.4 x 15.7cm, 4pp card. Two water colour paintings by Gary Hincks of wild growing flowers have two different Finlay definition works noted below each - the first is:

WILDFLOWER, n. a wayside text

and

WILDFLOWER, n. an inflammatory text

VG+.

...

10 Aug

Posted at 19:10h in Invitation Cards

Edinburgh: Graeme Murray Gallery/Fruitmarket Gallery 1992
21 x 7.8cm, 4pp announcement card with offers of editions and books released during the solo exhibition with a reproduction of Finlay's Evening Will Come They Will Sew The Blue Sail on the front in blue on white. The card announces the release of the second edition of the print (which was signed and numbered unlike the first edition from 1970). VG+.

...

15 Jun

Posted at 17:15h in Proposals

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1995
23.2 x 12.5cm, 8pp. A proposal for a public work at the Botanic Gardens, University of Durham where a post of green oak is carved with a combination of numbers that are rearranged in each row (as a "method " used by bellringers) - Finlay notes this references the nearby Cathedral with its bells and the foxglove plants that also have bells. Three watercolour paintings by Ron Costley are reproduced. VG+....

15 Jun

Posted at 17:08h in Proposals

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1993
23.4 x 18cm, 4pp. A proposal for a permanent installation in a new art museum planned for Germany. The work consists of a sentence from Saint-Just in four different languages:

THE NATIVE LAND IS NOT THE LAND IT IS THE COMMUNITY OF FEELINGS

on the ground of a 60 x 60m terrace. VG+. ...

10 Jun

Posted at 18:51h in Artist's Postcards

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, n.d. (1992) 10.2 x 6,.6cm, plain manilla envelope content of three 10 x 6cm, 1pp cards. The cards have texts at the top -

shepherd of stones on the grey card

pastor of oaks on the green card

and "pasteur de chenes" a quote from E. Lochac's Obelisque on the last white card. Lochac was a Jewish Ukrainian poet who lived in France and was persecuted by the Nazis. All VG+ in like envelope. ...

26 May

Posted at 20:03h in CATALOGUE RAISONNES

Koln:: Walther Konig, 1992
25 x 19.5cm, 212pp plus yellow stamped gray paper boards. The first extensive catalogue raisonee of Boltanski's artist's books, mail art, ephemera and editioned works from the period 1966 - 1982. Edited by Jennifer Flay it covers 80 different items and is illustrated in b/w throughout. Text in German, French and English.
This copy is in VG+ condition and is signed by Boltanski on an end page. VG+.

...

21 May

Posted at 15:04h in Artist's Books

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1992
9 x 11.4cm, 8pp plus card wrappers and green printed dust jacket. Two colour photographs by Eva Maria Weinmayer of a tree house which is revealed in the second photograph to be a model and incomplete. The two texts are both from Wittgenstein. The first which shows the seemingly complete treehouse is
"7. What we cannot speak about we must pass over in silence."
and the second with the image that reveals the "tree house" to be fake is
"7.01 What we cannot speak about we must construct."
This is reminiscent of Lawrence Weiner's dictum on conceptual art:

1. The artist may construct the piece.
2. The piece may be fabricated.
3. The piece need not be built.
Each being equal and consistent with the intent of the artist, the decision as to condition rests with the receiver upon the occasion of receivership.

But of course Wittgenstein is interested in truth to which his solution was to say the only possible truth to be known is tautological. Finlay seems to be suggesting that an alternative is to create a new truth.
The treehouse was made by "Kroder, Korner and Weinmayr. VG+.

...

15 May

Posted at 17:23h in Proposals

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1992
16.4 x 14.9cm, outer folder content of a concertina 8pp insert printed one side only. A proposal for an "abbreviated doric temple" built on a hillside with four doric pillars but only completing part of a semi-circle. Finlay offers that the structure:

"embodies the original meaning of templum as a space marked out for divination. The stylobate is complete; the part-entabulature and supporting columns delineate "sacred" areas of the sky and, with the autere Latin inscription, frame the "everlasting" - also ephermeral - "temples: of the clouds."

The temple has the phrase "Aetema templa caeli" which translates to "the everlasting temples of the sky" which was cited by Varro in his De Lingua Latina.

There are three drawings by Mark Stewart - plans, sections and side elevations as well as an in situ drawing.
Sadly the printing of the inner pages has been poorly finished and there is sett off between the pages - else VG+. ...

Shopping cart0
There are no products in the cart!
Continue shopping