Book Description

Réponse de Greg Allen à la question si cet ouvrage est un livre d'artiste et si lui-même se considère comme un artiste : "For the shortest response, related perhaps to taxonomy or cataloguing, I agree to be described as an artist, though I generally avoid claiming this role for myself. There are a couple of variations of the books. The entire project can be considered a work of art. Some books, those ordered via websites like Amazon, which come directly from the distributor, are probably best considered as documents. When bookstores order books from me, I stamp them myself, and fulfill their orders. These could be considered a special edition, but not limited or numbered. A very few examples of the books have been prepared by me with a painted insert, and highlights/drawings. These are usually for friends, trade with artists, or, for sale in exhibition. I believe a pair of volumes like this was provided to a bookstore in Geneva recently, and if this is the particular set you are wondering about, they can certainly be considered artist books. The inspiration for this project was the unexpectedly substantive comments of a well-known artist who was compelled to discuss his work in a context beyond his control. Preserving and making the legal documentation available in an art context was certainly my goal, and however that is accomplished is fine : whether as criticism, art historical text, art, or performance. [I have so far done one staged reading of excerpts from Prince's deposition, and produced a unique hand-painted copy of the transcript for the collector involved with it.] A direct model for the books project was Martha Buskirk and Clara Weyergraf Serra's anthology, The Destruction of Tilted Arc [October Books]. That said, I intentionally opted for a facsimile approach rather than an editorial one because I felt that the aesthetic and informational elements of the court documents with their original formatting was significant, and I felt its absence in the Tilted Arc book. So in this way, the books were conceived as something more than just documentation. As you may know, a trade edition of Prince's deposition, designed beautifully by Lex Trueb, was published by Bookhorse.ch. I wrote the foreword for this edition and am credited as editor, and it is definitely the most traditional "book" version around. It is optimized to be read on a beach, which was not a factor I paid attention to for my original version. [I would say that Vol. 2 was created with even more aesthetic considerations, and as an appropriation and recontextualization of the highly specific aesthetic choices of the court system itself. It was also obviously intended to be and produced as a companion, or complement, to the original volume.] As for calling myself an artist, at this point, it's probably inevitable, and the easiest thing to do, but I still approach the question with ambivalence. I have spent a great deal of time in the art world as a "collector," and have long found that the implications of privilege and the power dynamic associated with collecting are problematic. But switching from collector to artist is not just a matter of trading one paradigm of credibility for another; it presents its own hurdles. So I am generally wary of presenting myself as an artist, even though I may be one of the few people who would see it as conflicted. I am also more than ambivalent about the claims of authorship or originality that seem so inextricably tied to the role of artist. For this reason especially, the Prince book project was a formative experiment in appropriation as a creative practice; it was still my book, even though I clearly did not write it. Over the last several years, I have realized that my blog and the projects it spawns constitute a practice; they don't just document one. Whether this results in objects that are immediately recognizable as artworks, or situations and propositions that question or evade this simple classification, the frame of artist and artwork is never not part of my process. I realized several paragraphs ago that this was too much information, and I went ahead with it anyway, so I hope you'll excuse any excess, and that you'll find the relevant information you need for your own purposes. It would please me greatly to know that you gave the books consideration, and I'd rather you use your own judgment to maximize their impact or reach than for me to be too doctrinaire about their status. If you have any additional questions or concerns, I hope you'll feel welcome to ask."