Hans-Ulrich Obrist

Hans Ulrich Obrist has been conducting ongoing conversations with the world's greatest living artists since he began in Switzerland, aged 19, with Fischli and Weiss. Here he chooses 19 of the greatest figures and presents their conversations, offering the reader intimacy with the artists and insight into their creative processes.

Inspired by the great Vasari, Lives of the Artists, Lives of the Architects explores the meaning of art and artists today, their varying approaches to creating, and a sense of how their thinking evolves over time. Including David Hockney, Gilbert and George, Gerhard Richter, Louise Bourgeois, Rem Koolhaas, and Oscar Niemeyer, this is a wonderful and unique book for those interested in modern art.… (meer)

The texts in this two-volume set trace the development of John Baldessari’s understanding of art from the early 1960s through to the present. His writings in this volume (1975–2011) address a broad range of topics, from the system he uses to classify material in the studio, his tributes to other artists, through money in the art world. Principle among Baldessari’s themes is his long-standing investigation into the similarity and possible interchangeability of word and image. In his view, words have the advantage of being the most abstract though paradoxically the most common and understood form of communication, thus making it possible to catch more of the world in the net—not just the picturesque. All the writings included here are motivated by that impulse and to ever expand the possibility of art.… (meer)

It is not an exaggeration to write that Hans Ulrich Obrist is everywhere, has curated everything and has interviewed everyone. If "peripatetic" is the word most overused to describe him, it is not inappropriate. The Swiss-born, everywhere-based curator and head of the Programme Migrateurs at the Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris has an unstoppable wanderlust and a related symptom: his penchant for interviewing anyone and everyone who piques his curiosity, be they artist, scientist, writer, curator, composer, architect, thinker, etc. Since 1993, Obrist has conducted more than 300 interviews, 75 of which are collected here in a selection that respects the cultural and professional diversity of the interviewees. Each interview is introduced by a short text outlining the biography of the interviewee and giving some contextual information on the recording of the interview.… (meer)

Exhibition catalogue cum artist's project titled "World Soup : The Kitchen Show" published in conjunction with Hans Ulrich-Obrist's first curatorial project, a show held at Schwalbenstrasse 10, St. Gallen, Switzerland, July - September 1991. Includes the 1993 catalogue for the exhibition with text by Obrist, in parallel English and German tranlated by Uta Nusser. Includes contributions by the participating artists in the form of brochures, artist's books, postcards and prints housed in a printed folder within a manila envelope, edited by Hans Ulrich Obrist. Contents include, in addition to the catalogue: "Plats du jour," a brochure by Christian Boltanski; "L'art de la cuisine," two artist's books, one text based and one image based, and three cards housed in a glassine sleeve by Fréderic Bruly Bouabré; "Katalog," a black-and-white artist's book by Hans-Peter Feldmann; "Nymphæa alba L.," a text based card by Paul Armand Gette; "Messer," a facsimile image by C.O. Paeffgen; "Fässer," a full color artist's book by Roman Signer; "Photoabzüge," a set of seven photographs in an envelope by Richard Wentworth; and "Coop," a full color circular for Coop Zürich, a grocery story, by Peter Fischli/David Weiss.… (meer)