A Project About Artist Novels

 “…what would change into art practice from the moment that we accept the artist novel as a valid, legitimate art format?” – David Maroto

For the occasion of our first video interview, Blonde Art Books had the pleasure of speaking with the curators and two of the artists (Jill Magid and Julia Weist) from ‘The Book Lovers: A Project about Artist Novels’ at the Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts. The on-going project as well as the interview express the imagined possibilities and difficulties of the artist as novelist. The multifaceted presentation at the Elizabeth Foundation included the exhibition of eight artists’ works along side over a hundred titles. The Book Lovers promises to evolve as it moves from location to location and as David Maroto and Joanna Zielińska continue their research and investigation with an ever expanding collection of artist novels.

The video was filmed by Martyna Szczesna and edited by Martyna Szczesna and Sonel Breslav. For best viewing please set your quality to 720HD.

Many thanks to David Maroto, Joanna Zielińska, Jill Magid, Julia Weist, Michelle Levy, and Martyna Szczesna.

The Book Lovers: A Project about Artist Novels
Curated by David Maroto and Joanna Zielińska
Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts
January 25 – March 9, 2013.
http://www.thebooklovers.info

With artworks by: Tim Etchells (UK), Tom Gidley (UK), Jill Magid (USA), Roee Rosen (Israel), Lindsay Seers (UK), Goldin+Senneby (Sweden), Alexandre Singh (France), Julia Weist (USA)

With novels by: Carl Andre, Keren Cytter, Salvador Dalí, Tim Etchells, Liam Gillick, Pablo Helguera, Stewart Home, Joseph Kosuth, Yayoi Kusama, Jana Leo, Mai-Thu Perret, Tom McCarthy, Richard Prince, Andy Warhol… to a total of around 130 titles.

From the press release:

The Book Lovers is a systematic attempt to study the phenomenon of artist novels. An investigation of the creative consequences when artists choose the novel as a medium is the core of this long-term project and research. For an increasing number of artists, the novel is becoming a means to generate new art objects in the scope of a multidisciplinary practice. A collection of novels written by artists and a parallel online database are available for public perusal in a Reading Room, together with a selection of artworks that are inextricably linked to some of the novels. The artist novels collection was also on view at M HKA (Museum of Contemporary Art in Antwerp, Belgium and it has been acquired by the museum to be included in its collection.

Official website for The Books Lovers.