Thierry de Duve

Jeff Wall is foremost among the artists who since the late 1960s have brought photography to the forefront of contemporary art. This revised and expanded edition of the definitive monograph on the Canadian artist, first published in 1996, includes a new fully illustrated essay on Wall's recent work by the French historian of art and photography Jean-François Chevrier, in addition to the artist's recent writings. Describing himself as 'a painter of modern life', Wall produces huge transparencies mounted onto light boxes which diffuse a brilliant glow through his photographs of contemporary urban scenes and 'constructed' social situations. These images employ the latest technology to create tableaux which are evocative of subjects ranging from Hollywood cinema to nineteenth-century history painting. When installed they evoke both the seduction of the cinema screen and the physical presence of minimalist sculptures. Wall engages at a sophisticated level with theories of representation both as an artist and as a theoretical writer on contemporary art and culture. Major surveys of his work have been presented at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago (1995); the Galerie Nationale du Jeu de Paume, Paris (1995); the Whitechapel Art Gallery, London (1996), and the Musée d'Art Contemporain, Montreal (1999).… (altro)

Catalogue for a permanent installation in Stykkisholmur (Iceland) starting in 2007.

‘"Vatnasafn/Library of Water," commissioned by Artangel and created by New York artist Roni Horn incorporates a very unique take on the local geography, geology, climate and culture. In place of the former library’s book collection, Horn has installed 24 vertical glass columns, stretching from floor to ceiling, each filled with water collected from Iceland’s rapidly receding glaciers. The resulting collection is a metaphysical archive of Iceland’s geological history, together with an arresting effect of refracted and reflected light in the open space.'

(Abstract source: http://www.wallpaper.com)… (altro)