Greek collector Dakis Joannou is one of the preeminent collectors of contemporary art in the world, with a collection that stands as a virtual who's who of artists from the 1980s through today. 85 of those artists are represented in Monument to Now--the most utterly relevant to today, of course. Leading curators from New York, Milan and Paris have contributed essays and helped to select the included artists. Designed by acclaimed graphic artist Stefan Sagmeister, the hardcover edition features a three-dimensional monument affixed to the front cover; the paperback retains some trace of the monument, perhaps a footprint of the monument on the front cover, a pop-up monument inside, or some other invention. The follow-up to Everything That's Interesting Is New, an earlier book on the Joannou collection, Monument to Now strictly includes work dating from 1985 and later, with a focus on the artists who are most relevant now. Among many new acquisitions featured here for the first time are works by Vanessa Beecroft, Maurizio Cattelan, Gregory Crewdson, Anna Gaskell, Mariko Mori, Chris Ofili, Tom Sachs, Fred Tomaselli and Kara Walker. Other included artists are Janine Antoni, Matthew Barney, Ashley Bickerton, Rineke Dijkstra, Olafur Eliasson, Robert Gober, Andreas Gursky, Peter Halley, Mike Kelley, Toba Khedoori, Jeff Koons, Paul McCarthy, Takashi Murakami, Shirin Neshat, Tim Noble &amp; Sue Webster, Cady Noland, Gabriel Orozco, Charles Ray, Cindy Sherman, Kiki Smith, Wolfgang Tillmans, Gillian Wearing, Christopher Wool and Chen Zhen.

Monument To Now: The Dakis Joannou Collection

Arts & Photography

Collections, Catalogs & Exhibitions

DESTE Foundation for Contemporary Art

Greek collector Dakis Joannou is one of the preeminent collectors of contemporary art in the world, with a collection that stands as a virtual who's who of artists from the 1980s through today. 85 of those artists are represented in Monument to Now--the most utterly relevant to today, of course. Leading curators from New York, Milan and Paris have contributed essays and selected the included artists. Designed by acclaimed graphic artist Stefan Sagmeister, the hardcover edition features a three-dimensional monument affixed to the front cover; the paperback retains some trace of the monument, perhaps a footprint of the monument on the front cover, a pop-up monument inside, or some other invention. The follow-up to Everything That's Interesting Is New, an earlier book on the Joannou collection, Monument to Now strictly includes work dating from 1985 and later, with a focus on the artists who are most relevant now. Among many new acquisitions featured are works by Vanessa Beecroft, Maurizio Cattelan, Gregory Crewdson, Anna Gaskell, Mariko Mori, Chris Ofili, Tom Sachs, Fred Tomaselli and Kara Walker. Other included artists are Janine Antoni, Matthew Barney, Ashley Bickerton, Rineke Dijkstra, Olafur Eliasson, Robert Gober, Andreas Gursky, Peter Halley, Mike Kelley, Toba Khedoori, Jeff Koons, Paul McCarthy, Takashi Murakami, Shirin Neshat, Tim Noble &amp; Sue Webster, Cady Noland, Gabriel Orozco, Charles Ray, Cindy Sherman, Kiki Smith, Wolfgang Tillmans, Gillian Wearing, Christopher Wool and Chen Zhen.

A culture's body image, as refracted through its art, will usually provide a more telling account of its preoccupations than the most explicit political art; it seems that cultural symptoms leak more readily into depictions of the body than into more overt statements. This is especially true in periods of heightened alienation, when the solitary figure gains poignancy, but bodies register their eras in many ways: the signifiers of opulence, imperialism, fashion, social decay, sexual convention and anxiety can all be readily inscribed onto the human form in art--and indeed, always have been. Fractured Figure projects our millennial moment as one of fragile bodies pitched against a restless, dysphasic backdrop, in which terrorism and global warming impinge as daily realities. It draws on the world-renowned contemporary collection of Dakis Joannou, who, in collaboration with Jeffrey Deitch, has previously organized shows such as Artificial Nature and Post Human, in which similar concerns have arisen. Here, in works by Chris Ofili, David Altmejd, Richard Prince, Urs Fischer, Pawel Althamer, Ashley Bickerton, Barnaby Furnas and others, the figure is shown as un-idealized and compellingly mortal--situated in a realm that we will immediately recognize as our own.

Fractured Figure, Volume I

Charley is an approximately annual publication edited by Maurizio Cattelan, Massimiliano Gioni and Ali Subotnick, and designed by The Purtill Family Business. It is as visual as a magazine and as substantial as a book, but refuses to abide by either genre's rules. Following earlier editions on the 2001-2002 New York art season, on neglected artists from the 80s and early 90s, and on museum acquisitions, this new volume rounds up the stray dogs of contemporary art--Charley 5 features artists who have remained forgotten, proudly secluded or just unnoticed, in spite of their visionary work. Its galleries of obsessions mix professionals and amateurs, cult figures and unknowns, unheard prophets, voluntary outcasts and great solitary masters and freaks, celebrating the extreme subjectivity of more than 50 voices and implicitly questioning accepted hierarchies in the process. The editors have said of their recent work, "it's a way to say, look around The latest issues of Charley are a lot about 'What ifs': what if there were many more artists than we actually speak about? What if our artist list was just partial and irrelevant?" Charley is sponsored by the Deste Foundation, Athens, Greece, which supports artist's projects, exhibitions, and symposia that explore the relationship between contemporary art and culture.

Charley 05

History & Criticism

Charley Independents looks at international artist collectives and curatorial organizations that are initiating strategies for the distribution of art: 98 Weeks Research Project, Arrow Factory, Cemeti Art House, Invisible Academy, Latitudes, Light Industry, Mono.kultur, Collective Parasol, Post-Museum, Scrawl Collective and many others. Charley is sponsored by the Deste Foundation, Athens, Greece, which supports artist's projects, exhibitions, and symposia that explore the relationship between contemporary art and culture.

Charley Independents: No Soul For Sale

Following in the wake of Maurizio Cattelan's cult publications Permanent Food and Charley, this inaugural issue of the artist's newest print enterprise Toilet Paper comes straight from the aberrant, animated mind of the Italian-born provocateur, mischief-maker and macabre witness to our times. Conceived in collaboration with photographer Pierpaolo Ferrari and published by Deste, Toilet Paper contains no text but combines commercial photography with twisted narrative tableaux and surrealistic imagery to create a journal that is as appropriate for the coffee table as it is for the WC. Contributors to this founding issue include Jacopo Emiliani, Alberto Zanetti, Elisabetta Claudio, Federico Albertini and Andrea Mineo.

Toilet Paper Issue #1

Individual Artists

Brought to you by the aberrant, animated mind of Italian-born provocateur, mischief-maker, and macabre witness to our times Maurizio Cattelan, Toilet Paper 2 follows closely on the heels of the inaugural issue of Cattelan's most recent print extravaganza. "The magazine springs from a passion/obsession that Maurizio and I have in common," collaborator photographer Pierpaolo Ferrari said in an interview in Vogue Italia. "Each picture springs from an idea, even a simple one, and then becomes a complex orchestration of people who build tableaux vivants. This project is also a sort of mental outburst." Published by Deste, this part magazine, part artist's book blends commercial photography with warped narratives and surrealistic imagery, creating a series of powerful images that are as appropriate for the coffee table as they are for the WC.

Toilet Paper: Issue 2

Toilet Paper is Maurizio Cattelan's newest print enterprise, brought to you straight from the aberrant, animated mind of this Italian-born provocateur, mischief-maker and macabre witness to our times. ""Maurizio Cattelan's latest publication, Toilet Paper, follows his previous periodicals, Permanent Food and Charley, with what appears to be a slim folio of appropriated photographs. [...] TP contains no text, only a series of double-page spreads reminiscent of Permanent Food's wildly unpredictable mash-up of styles,"" says Vince Aletti in Photograph Magazine. Conceived in collaboration with photographer Pierpaolo Ferrari and published by Deste, Toilet Paper 3 was inspired by Robert Rauschenberg and Thomas Hirschhorn, and features a series of powerful visual tableaux that are as appropriate for the coffee table as they are for the WC.

Toilet Paper: Issue 3

Specially created by Maurizio Cattelan in collaboration with fellow countryman Pierpaolo Ferrari for Cattelan's major retrospective at the Guggenheim Museum in New York City, Toilet Paper 4 is a brilliant new creation from the aberrant, animated mind of the Italian-born provocateur, mischief-maker and macabre witness to our times. Published by Deste, this part artist's book, part magazine contains no text; only full spreads of color photographs with imagery that often appropriates the slick production values of commercial photography to deliver dreamlike (or nightmarish) images that are as appropriate for the coffee table as they are for the WC. In an interview with Vogue Italia, Ferrari said that "the magazine springs from a passion/obsession that Maurizio and I have in common. Each picture springs from an idea, even a simple one, and then becomes a complex orchestration of people who build tableaux vivants. This project is also a sort of mental outburst."

Toilet Paper: Issue 4

Neither an academic textbook nor a conventional art book, Liquid Antiquity explores the intersection between contemporary art and antiquity in a fluid stream of images, ideas and voices.
This visual essay spans more than 2,500 years of art history in an open-ended dialogue with a series of critical texts and interviews with contemporary artists, exploring the possibility of reinventing classicism and arguing for its enduring influence on contemporary art. It includes a critical essay by Brooke Holmes investigating the concept of “liquid antiquity”; a series of 27 lexemes that critically rethink the traditional language of classicism, written by prominent critics and scholars; and ten interviews with contemporary artists (Matthew Barney, Paul Chan, Haris Epaminonda, Urs Fischer, Jeff Koons, Christodoulos Panayiotou, Charles Ray, Asad Raza, Kaari Upson and Adrián Villar Rojas).

Liquid Antiquity

See the best price to sell, buy or rent books by the DESTE Foundation for Contemporary Art publisher. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by DESTE Foundation for Contemporary Art

See the best price to sell, buy or rent books by the DESTE Foundation for Contemporary Art publisher. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Monument To Now: The Dakis Joannou Collection

Monument To Now: The Dakis Joannou Collection

Fractured Figure, Volume I

Charley 05

Charley Independents: No Soul For Sale

Toilet Paper Issue #1

Toilet Paper: Issue 2

Toilet Paper: Issue 3

Toilet Paper: Issue 4

Liquid Antiquity