Ignored for decades by official art-history discourses, Italian Carol Rama (1918-2006) can be considered today to be one of the essential artists for understanding 20th-century production. Through a selection of 120 works--mostly paintings--and essays by Paul B. Preciado, Anne Dressen and Teresa Grandas, in addition to the contributions of a selection of artists, writers and musicians, this clothbound volume proposes an attempt to recognize and restore a life's work--one markedly feminine and sexualized--still unknown but nevertheless slated to become classic. This publication aims not only to explore the art of Carol Rama, but also to challenge the dominant narratives of art history through work that requires us to undo narratives and reformulate concepts. Almost forgotten by art history and the feminist movement, the work of Rama, stretching over seven decades, constitutes an anti-archive allowing a reconstruction of the avant-garde movements of the 20th century.

The Passion According to Carol Rama

Arts & Photography

Reines, Ariana

Vergine, Lea

Bal-Blanc, Pierre

Halbertam, Jack

Individual Artists

Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona

When The Body as Language ("Body-art" and Performance) appeared in 1974, it was immediately a huge publishing hit, reviewed by some of the most influential art historians and writers (Giulio C. Argan, Edoardo Sanguineti, Max Kozloff, Lucy Lippard, François Pluchart, Peter Gorsen, Evelyn Weiss and many others). A direct testimony of the birth and development of one of the most controversial art trends, Lea Vergine's book avails of a series of texts by the artists themselves, whom the author had asked to contribute with a statement about the illustrations of their work. Featuring a thorough documentation of original photographs and film photograms, videotapes, happenings, actions and performances, the book analyses the evolution of this phenomenon through the works of sixty artists, including Gina Pane, Gilbert &amp; George, Urs Lüthi and Katharina Sieverding, Rebecca Horn, Trisha Brown, Günter Brus and many others who have worked with and on the body. In an absolutely unusual publishing event, nearly thirty years after the first edition, the text--by now a classic--is republished with all the original photographic material. The volume is enhanced and brought up-to-date by an afterword by Lea Vergine, who observes the changes of Body Art throughout the nineties: Orlan, Stelarc, Ron Athey, Franko B., Yasumasa Morimura, Jana Sterbak, Matthew Barney are "virtuosos of disorder and hungry for afflictions of any and every kind, mystics--like persons who display the subjection of their bodies to cruel and invasive devices, or who revel in virtual fantasies of such self-inflicted pains--destroy themselves in order newly to find themselves. . . . They finally pay a visit to the world of the saints and victims, exploring and prolonging its seductions." When The Body as Language ("Body-art" and Performance) appeared in 1974, it was immediately a huge publishing hit, reviewed by some of the most influential art historians and writers (Giulio C. Argan, Edoardo Sanguineti, Max Kozloff, Lucy Lippard, François Pluchart, Peter Gorsen, Evelyn Weiss and many others). A direct testimony of the birth and development of one of the most controversial art trends, Lea Vergine's book avails of a series of texts by the artists themselves, whom the author had asked to contribute with a statement about the illustrations of their work. Featuring a thorough documentation of original photographs and film photograms, videotapes, happenings, actions and performances, the book analyses the evolution of this phenomenon through the works of sixty artists, including Gina Pane, Gilbert &amp; George, Urs Lüthi and Katharina Sieverding, Rebecca Horn, Trisha Brown, Günter Brus and many others who have worked with and on the body. In an absolutely unusual publishing event, nearly thirty years after the first edition, the text--by now a classic--is republished with all the original photographic material. The volume is enhanced and brought up-to-date by an afterword by Lea Vergine, who observes the changes of Body Art throughout the nineties: Orlan, Stelarc, Ron Athey, Franko B., Yasumasa Morimura, Jana Sterbak, Matthew Barney are "virtuosos of disorder and hungry for afflictions of any and every kind, mystics--like persons who display the subjection of their bodies to cruel and invasive devices, or who revel in virtual fantasies of such self-inflicted pains--destroy themselves in order newly to find themselves. . . . They finally pay a visit to the world of the saints and victims, exploring and prolonging its seductions."

Body Art: The Body as Language

History & Criticism

Skira

When The Body as Language ("Body-art" and Performance) appeared in 1974, it was immediately a huge publishing hit, reviewed by some of the most influential art historians and writers (Giulio C. Argan, Edoardo Sanguineti, Max Kozloff, Lucy Lippard, François Pluchart, Peter Gorsen, Evelyn Weiss and many others). A direct testimony of the birth and development of one of the most controversial art trends, Lea Vergine's book avails of a series of texts by the artists themselves, whom the author had asked to contribute with a statement about the illustrations of their work. Featuring a thorough documentation of original photographs and film photograms, videotapes, happenings, actions and performances, the book analyses the evolution of this phenomenon through the works of sixty artists, including Gina Pane, Gilbert &amp; George, Urs Lüthi and Katharina Sieverding, Rebecca Horn, Trisha Brown, Günter Brus and many others who have worked with and on the body. In an absolutely unusual publishing event, nearly thirty years after the first edition, the text--by now a classic--is republished with all the original photographic material. The volume is enhanced and brought up-to-date by an afterword by Lea Vergine, who observes the changes of Body Art throughout the nineties: Orlan, Stelarc, Ron Athey, Franko B., Yasumasa Morimura, Jana Sterbak, Matthew Barney are "virtuosos of disorder and hungry for afflictions of any and every kind, mystics--like persons who display the subjection of their bodies to cruel and invasive devices, or who revel in virtual fantasies of such self-inflicted pains--destroy themselves in order newly to find themselves. . . . They finally pay a visit to the world of the saints and victims, exploring and prolonging its seductions." When The Body as Language ("Body-art" and Performance) appeared in 1974, it was immediately a huge publishing hit, reviewed by some of the most influential art historians and writers (Giulio C. Argan, Edoardo Sanguineti, Max Kozloff, Lucy Lippard, François Pluchart, Peter Gorsen, Evelyn Weiss and many others). A direct testimony of the birth and development of one of the most controversial art trends, Lea Vergine's book avails of a series of texts by the artists themselves, whom the author had asked to contribute with a statement about the illustrations of their work. Featuring a thorough documentation of original photographs and film photograms, videotapes, happenings, actions and performances, the book analyses the evolution of this phenomenon through the works of sixty artists, including Gina Pane, Gilbert &amp; George, Urs Lüthi and Katharina Sieverding, Rebecca Horn, Trisha Brown, Günter Brus and many others who have worked with and on the body. In an absolutely unusual publishing event, nearly thirty years after the first edition, the text--by now a classic--is republished with all the original photographic material. The volume is enhanced and brought up-to-date by an afterword by Lea Vergine, who observes the changes of Body Art throughout the nineties: Orlan, Stelarc, Ron Athey, Franko B., Yasumasa Morimura, Jana Sterbak, Matthew Barney are "virtuosos of disorder and hungry for afflictions of any and every kind, mystics--like persons who display the subjection of their bodies to cruel and invasive devices, or who revel in virtual fantasies of such self-inflicted pains--destroy themselves in order newly to find themselves. . . . They finally pay a visit to the world of the saints and victims, exploring and prolonging its seductions."

Body Art and Performance: The Body as Language

"The concept of the beautiful has undergone profound changes during the last half of the twentieth century, as has our way of considering everything that is called art. We need a new key to help us "know how to see" so that we can stay attuned to what is going on in the contemporary world of art where new aesthetic styles are appearing and being challenged one after the other." "This book by Lea Vergine, which discusses seventeen different art movements in separate chapters, offers, within the panorama of contemporary art criticism books, a blend between a handy art-history manual and an assessment of a cultural adventure that has passed through and overturned the parameters of taste of the last forty years. The clear and incisive writing style guides the reader, student or specialist, whatever his or her specific interests and curiosities, like an essential travel kit for understanding today's reality, grasping its raison d'etre, and above all, plunging into its multiple mutations."

Art on the Cutting Edge: A Guide to Contemporary Movements (Skira Paperbacks)

In the artist's words, "Hallenbad Book is a mystical diary, a mental Matryoshka doll in which different levels of livability and light are penetrated... a continuous refuge from the danger of losing one's life."

Letizia Cariello: Hallenbad Book

Charta