V.Vale on RE/Search publications

From noon to 1:30 today at Edition Toronto, V.Vale from RE/Search publications will be speaking in conversation with Lauren Wetmore.

"RE/Search Publications was founded by V. Vale in 1977 out of San Francisco’s City Lights Bookstore with a $200 loan from Allen Ginsberg and Lawrence Ferlinghetti. Over the subsequent four decades RE/Search became the essential source for pre-internet, punk, and counter-culture independent publishing. Based out of San Francisco, DIY strategies informed the voice and design of the publications, which take the form of tabloids, handbooks, textbooks, and zines, and feature interviews, ephemera, commissioned artwork, and literature. RE/Search was a vital early platform for many artists, writers, and performers who have gone on to exemplify experimental and punk practices including The Yes Men, Annie Sprinkle, Lydia Lunch, and George Kuchar. It was also an essential republication source for banned or out-of-print material by J.G. Ballard, William Burroughs, Brion Gysin, and Octave Mirbeau. RE/Search publication’s catalogue provides on-the-ground portraits of underground cultural movements such as Noise music (The Industrial Culture Handbook, 1983), body art and ethnographic practices (Modern Primitives, 1989), feminist performance art (Angry Women, 1991), and independent publishing, (Zines Vol.1 and 2, 1996).Curator and writer Lauren Wetmore presents Incredibly Strange Resistance: 40 years of RE/Search Publications, a history of RE/Search Publications featuring ephemera and footage from V. Vale’s archive. The lecture, followed by a Q&A with Momus publisher Sky Goodden, illuminates RE/Search Publication’s uncompromising practice of political and cultural resistance through DIY publishing – a unique position in North American art-house publishing and a vital perspective for the contemporary context."

Lee Henderson | To Conjure From Vapour

Lee Henderson
To Conjure From Vapour
Toronto, Canada: Nothing Else Press, 2017
80pp., 13 x 8 x 3.5 cm., boxed
Edition of 125 numbered copies.

The Nothing Else Press is very pleased to announce the publication of a new work by Toronto-based artist Lee Henderson. Henderson was artist-in-residence this summer at the Glenfiddich Distillery in Dufftown, Scotland, where he produced several works which examined the notion of "spirit" ranging from supernatural apparitions, to the ideal of camaraderie, to the sort we imbibe.

To Conjure From Vapour is a tarot deck of metaphysical whisky tasting notes:

"The "tasting note" is an increasingly common technique in the promotion of scotch whisky. Most immediately, it can be described as any (expert?) account of the flavours one can expect when tasting a whisky. But at its core is a paradox, or at the very least a riddle—it's a piece of scripted text that attempts to transform a direct, subjective, evanescent experience into a shared language. This should put it firmly into the demesne of poetry.

To Conjure From Vapour therefore considers the tasting note as a communion with the spirit world (spirit as alcohol, but also as breath, or soul, or ideal). It includes a card with a custom text for each of the 22 Major Arcana and the 56 Minor Arcana, with the implements of spiritcraft replacing the traditional suits (barrel staves for wands, clocks for coins, glasses for cups, and hammers for swords). The deck facilitates the divination of one's taste before even touching the spirit; a potomancer's companion." 

- Lee Henderson

Henderson's practice includes video, photography, installation, sculpture, performance, and text. His work moves in constant contemplation of death, in senses grand and minute, somewhere between the persistence of collective histories and the brevity of individual lives. 

A solo exhibition of the work he produced as part of the Glenfiddich, And the Voices Came From Nowhere, can currently be seen at Zalucky Gallery until November 11th. His work can also be seen at Open Studio as part of a two-person visiting artist residency exhibition, until November 18th. 

Mathew Sawyer | Venn Diagram for the World

Mathew Sawyer
Venn Diagram for the World
Toronto, Canada: Nothing Else Press, 2017
13 x 9.5 cm.
Open edition


Nothing Else Press is pleased to announce the launch of a a new fridge magnet featuring Sawyer's 2010 work Venn Diagram for the World.

When he was still a student, Matthew Higgs compared Sawyer to both Martin Creed and Bas Jan Ader, in the pages of Art Forum. Skye Sherwin in the Guardian more recently wrote "[in Sawyer's Venn Diagram] there's the world we want and the world we live in, but there is no real world. By this, Sawyer is implying, of course, that we're solipsistic folk, stuck in the world in our head. He tests the boundaries, exploring what is arguably the crux of all art: the yearning to communicate and make sense of life, and the challenges of doing so."

Sawyer's work encompasses painting, drawing, sculpture, performance, discreet interventions, and music (writing, recording and performing under the name The Ghosts, and briefly as the drummer for the Television Personalities). Sawyer is based in London, England. Visit his website here for more information.

The work is available for purchase for $8.00 here, or at the Edition Toronto Art Book fair for $5.00 this weekend.

Brian Eno, My Bloody Valentine

In 1990, Brian Eno gave a lecture at New York’s Museum of Modern Art which is now most notorious for something that happened offstage - a few years later he revealed that he used the opportunity to piss in Duchamp’s fountain:

I thought, how ridiculous that this particular … pisspot gets carried around the world at—it costs about thirty or forty thousand dollars to insure it every time it travels. I thought, How absolutely stupid, the whole message of this work is, “You can take any object and put it in a gallery.” It doesn’t have to be that one, that’s losing the point completely. And this seemed to me an example of the art world once again covering itself by drawing a fence around that thing, saying, “This isn’t just any ordinary piss pot, this is THE one, the special one, the one that is worth all this money.”

So I thought, somebody should piss in that thing, to sort of bring it back to where it belonged. So I decided it had to be me.

The lecture addressed similar concerns about high and low culture, and during it he mentioned a favorite piece of music from earlier that year - My Bloody Valentine’s Loveless, which he said "set a new standard for pop" . He described the single Soon as "the vaguest piece of music ever to get into the charts” and noted that if Steve Reich or Glenn Branca had been responsible for it they would have been given an award by the classical music establishment.

Almost thirty years later he and My Bloody Valentine's Kevin Shields have teamed up for a new song, the nine-minute Only Once Away My Son. Listen to it at Pitchfork, here.

Jack Pierson | Tomorrow’s Man 4

Jack Pierson
Tomorrow’s Man 4
Port Colborne, Canada: Bywater Bros. Editions, 2017
104 pp., 25.4 x 18.4 cm., softcover
Edition size unknown

Edited and designed by Jack Pierson and Roger Bywater

"The fourth volume in Jack Pierson’s celebrated Tomorrow’s Man artist book series mixes imagery from all spectrums of the visual landscape into a single mediation on the world around us. Combining archival material together with contributions by emerging and established artists, Tomorrow’s Man 4 continues on where the earlier volumes left off. Mixed together in its signature all over design format this installment showcases historical pen and ink sketches by John Tottenham, hummingbird portraits by Brian Calvin, glazed ceramic constructions by Liz Larner, and deadpan street shots by Trevor Hernandez (better known to many by his Instagram handle Gang Culture) together with contributions by Cali Dewitt, Paul Mpagi Sepuya, Lily Stockman, Richard Tinkler, and Evan Whale.

The title, Tomorrow’s Man, comes from an infamous bodybuilding magazine from the 1950s and ‘60s. Reappropriating the publication’s title as well as its retro bodybuilding aesthetic, Pierson takes viewers on a dizzying visual journey encompassing the full spectrum of cultural references. Includes a four large fold-out posters."

Launching at the Edition Toronto Art Fair this weekend.

Divya Mehra | Beach Towel



Divya Mehra
As a “Dilemma" We’re Seen as Enormous (Tokens are Currency): Beach Towel
Toronto, Canada: Art Metropole, 2017
60 × 35”
Edition of 36 signed copies

"Working in a variety of mediums, Divya Mehra addresses the effects of colonization and institutional racism, re-contextualizing references found in hip hop, literature and current affairs. Mehra’s practice explores diasporic identities, racialization, otherness and the construct of “diversity.” Her work has been featured many exhibitions and screenings, notably with Creative Time, MoMA PS1, MTV, and the Queens Museum (New York), MASS MoCA (North Adams), Artspeak (Vancouver), the Images Festival (Toronto), the Beijing 798 Biennale, Bielefelder Kunstverein, and Latitude 28 (Delhi). Mehra holds an MFA from Columbia University and is represented in Toronto by Georgia Scherman Projects. She divides her time between Winnipeg, Delhi and New York."

- Art Metropole

Available at the Art Metropole booth at Edition Toronto this weekend, for $115.00 CDN. 

Jon Sasaki | Skeleton Key to Many Cities

Jon Sasaki
Skeleton Key to Many Cities
Toronto, Canada: Casey House, 2010
1.5 x 5.5″
Edition of 125

A "Key to the City" is an honor bestowed by a mayor or city council to esteemed residents and visitors. The practice evokes the time of medieval walled cities, whose gates would be guarded during the day and locked at night. The key therefore symbolizes that the recipient is a "trusted friend of the city" and is therefore free to enter and leave the city at will.

Sasaki presents the buyer with a 'skeleton' or 'master' key, capable of opening multiple locks. The work is made of cast pewter and housed inside a black velvet case.

It is available from the publisher (in aid of their compassionate HIV/AIDS programs, which include inpatient care, day health program, community care and outreach, and social community programming) for $125, or at the Edition Art Book Fair this week, for the discounted price of $65.00.

C Magazine

C Magazine is a Toronto-based contemporary art and criticism periodical dedicated to "providing a forum for significant ideas in visual art and culture." Published quarterly, the issues each explore a different theme through commissioned texts and artists' projects. Recent themes include Voice, Land, Refusal and Force.

C The Visual Arts Foundation additionally produces artists' editions for their annual fundraising auction. Past artists have included Ken Lum, Roula Partheniou, Cedric Bomford (w/ Jim and Nathan Bomford), Jennifer Rose Sciarrino, Abbas Akhavan and many others. I believe some of these will be available at their booth at the upcoming Edition Toronto Fair.

Nothing Else Press

The Nothing Else Press will once again be participating in the Edition Toronto Art Book fair this weekend.  We'll be there with projects by Jonathan Monk, David Shrigley, (fair Director) Paul Butler, Micah Lexier, Vanessa Maltese, Jon Sasaki, Dean Baldwin, VSVSVS, Karen Azoulay (who is also participating in the fair this year), Daniel Eatock, Joy Walker, Cary Leibowitz, Garry Neill Kennedy, Robert Fones, Aleksandra Mir and many others. We will also be launching two new projects (details to follow.

Drop by and say hello.

Guy Anderson and Micah Lexier | My Hat

Guy Anderson and Micah Lexier
My Hat
Toronto, Canada, GuyGuyGuy, 2017
Dimensions vary.
Edition of 50.

Available for $20.00 CDN from GuyGuyGuy here, or at the Edition Toronto Art Book Fair this weekend.

Ron Terada | Cockatoo Island

Ron Terada
Cockatoo Island
Port Colbourne/Vancouver, Canada: Bywater Bros. Editions/Or Gallery, 2009
104 pp., 19.3 x 14 cm., hardcover
Edition of 500

This book documents Ron Terada’s walkabout of Cockatoo Island in September 2008. Expecting an exotic, tropical landscape replete with cockatoos and other rare fauna, Terada instead found himself on an island more in common to an isolated penitentiary like Alcatraz. Located off Sydney Harbour, Cockatoo Island was indeed once the site of a former prison and shipyard, yet on this occasion, also the setting for the 2008 Sydney Biennale.

Presented in a refined yet deadpan serial layout, Terada’s Cockatoo Island “blacks-out” any visual evidence regarding the works in the exhibit, the trajectory of his walk, or any clues to the island itself. What remain are the name of each participating artist as presented by the Biennale organizers: on homely, hand-made signage that evokes at once both protest and resignation.

Available for $25 here, or at the Bywater Bros table at Edition Toronto this week, at a special fair price of $2.50. 

Marc Fischer and Public Collectors | Library Excavations #4: Suspect Methodology

Marc Fischer and Public Collectors
Library Excavations #4: Suspect Methodology
Chicago, USA, Public Collectors, 2016
32 pp., 5.5 x 8.5”, staplebound
Edition of 501

"The images in this booklet are reproduced (without permission) from a study on personal appearance identification within a law enforcement environment. The study was published in 1972. In 2016 I found a copy of it in a reference section at Chicago Public Library’s Harold Washington Library Center. The authors of the study obtained mug shots from the Erie County Sheriff’s Department in New York, and used them in tests with Buffalo State College students as subjects. Who are the people in these mug shots? Did they consent to this? Some of these people appear to be in a state of distress. Were the people in these mug shots guilty of anything? Does it matter if they were?

This booklet highlights the violence of the researchers’ methodology. The people in these photos were turned into a collection of parts—scalped, fragmented, beheaded, and sorted by race and gender. The study’s aim was to help witnesses identify suspects more accurately, and help law enforcement personnel do a better job eliciting information from witnesses. Over forty years later, fear-based and prejudicial eyewitness accounts have produced thousands of false arrests, wrongful convictions, and deaths at the hands of police. I support activists who are calling for the end of both police violence and law enforcement used for social control. We need community solutions for transformative justice, not more police."

— Marc Fischer

Available at the Edition Toronto Art Fair, from Critical Distance Centre for Curators.

Kimberly Maher | Prompt Press 2

Kimberly Maher
Prompt Press 2
Iowa City, IA: Prompt Press, 2014
5.75” x 8.25”
Edition of 75 numbered copies

"This second issue of Prompt was designed and created by Kimberly Maher. The booklet was digitally printed by PIP. The cover was letterpress printed by the Following Moon Press in Iowa City. The spine design is Hedi Kyle's Blizzard book invention. The repetition of unfolding and folding pages symbolizes the unyielding yearning present in Still"

- colophon

For more information, visit Prompt Press at http://promptpress.org and the Edition Toronto Art Book Fair.

Karen Azoulay | YES / NO / MAYBE Scarf

Karen Azoulay in collaboration with M-82
YES / NO / MAYBE Scarf
Brooklyn, USA: M-82, 2017
7 x 63”
Edition of 25

Available for $100.00 from Karen Azoulay at the Edition Toronto Art Book Fair this week.

JP King | The Dictionary of Making / Thinking

JP King
The Dictionary of Making / Thinking
Toronto, Canada: Paper Pusher, 2017
200 pp, 5" x 8", Perfect Bound
Open Edition

Available for $20.00 from Paper Pusher, at the Edition Toronto Art Book Fair this week.

Brad Phillips | Mother Nature Mother Creature

Brad Phillips
Mother Nature Mother Creature
Toronto, Canada: Perish Publishing, 2014
[84] pp., 26.5 x 19 cm., softcover
Edition size unknown

"Brad Phillips is best known for his paintings which are frequently sourced from his own photographs. This is his first work to present solely original photographs. In a mocking nod to the prevalent imagery of naked women, usually models, in fashion editorials and advertising campaigns, as well as vintage pornography that fell under the rubric of ‘studying naturalism’, Phillips present a series of female nudes. He follows two tattooed woman as they undress, walk through a west-cost Canadian forest, and then dress. Feeling like the outtakes from a cult photo album, the images play with a notion raised by Elizabeth Barret Browning that the naked human body is sexual only a fraction of the time."

Available from the publisher for $30 CDN here, or at the Edition Toronto Art Book Fair later this week.

Martha Street Studio

Simon Hughes
John Graham's Mural 'Northern Lights' (1963, mosaic tile, aluminum and acrylic) at the Winnipeg International Airport (now destroyed)
Winnipeg, Canada: Martha Street Studio, 2017
20.5 x 57.75”
Edition of 15 signed copies

Erica Eyres
Lonely Girls 
Winnipeg, Canada: Martha Street Studio, 2008
Folio of 4 intaglio prints with handwork printed by Jeannette Johns
20.25 x15”
Edition of 10 signed copies
$1000 CDN

Michael Dumontier & Neil Farber
God’s Little Weirdo 
Winnipeg, Canada: Martha Street Studio, 2012
21 x 26” screenprints on Stonehenge paper, printed by Andrew Lodwick
Edition of 50 signed copies
$450 CDN


"Martha Street Studio, incorporated in 1988 as Manitoba Printmakers Association Inc, is a dynamic not-for-profit, artist-run centre located in the East Exchange District, that both preserves and advances the print arts. Our 4,000 square foot production space, sales area, and gallery occupy a fully–renovated and accessible heritage building. Through production, education, exhibitions and sales, we are a significant contributor to the progression of printmaking and to Winnipeg's cultural landscape. Martha Street Studio supports professional artists working within and on the periphery of traditional printmaking and cultivates new and emerging artists. Martha Street Studio also engages and connects communities through our programs and exhibitions and builds audiences and interest in printmaking."