Herzog & de Meuron: Natural History

More than any of their contemporaries, Swiss architects Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron are challenging the boundaries between architecture and art. Natural History explores that challenge, examining how the work of this formidable pair has drawn upon the art of both past and present, and brought architecture into dialogue with the art of our time. Echoing an encyclopedia, this publication reflects the natural history museum structure of the exhibition which it accompanies, organized by the Canadian Centre for Architecture. Models and projects by Herzog & de Meuron, as well as by other artists, are structured around six thematic portfolios that suggest an evolutionary history of the architects' work: Appropriation & Reconstruction, Transformation & Alienation, Stacking & Compression, Imprints & Moulds, Interlocking Spaces, and Beauty & Atmosphere. Each section is introduced with a statement from Herzog, and more than 20 artists, scholars, and architects have contributed essays, including Carrie Asman, Georges Didi-Huberman, Kurt W. Forster, Boris Groys, Ulrike Meyer Stump, Peggy Phelan, Thomas Ruff, Rebecca Schneider, Adolf Max Vogt, and Jeff Wall.

A building is a building. It cannot be read like a book; it doesn't have any credits, subtitles or labels like pictures in a gallery. In that sense, we are absolutely anti-representational. The strength of our buildings is the immediate, visceral impact they have on a visitor. --Jacques Herzog

Edited by Philip Ursprung. Contributions by Fernando Romero, Carrie Asman, Boris Groys, Gernot Bohme, Jeff Wall, Thomas Ruff, Alfred Richterich, Adolph Max Vogt, Alejandro Zaera-Polo, Reinhold Hohl, Petros Koumoutsakos, Albert Lutz, Christian Muoeix, Hurzeler, Catherine, Rebecca Schneider and Remy Zaugg. Foreword by Phyllis Lambert. Introduction by Kurt W. Forster.

Hardcover, 480 pages, 300 color and 200 b&w illustrations