Rodney Graham | Casino Royale (Sculpture de Voyage)

Rodney Graham

Casino Royale (Sculpture de Voyage)

Brussels, Belgium: Yves Gevaert Éditeur, 1990

7 x 30 x 25 cm (display case), 90 x 57 cm (poster)

Edition of 15 signed and numbered copies

Casino Royale (Sculpture de Voyage) is comprised of a paperback copy of Ian Fleming’s 1953 James Bond novel Casino Royale (Coronet Books, 1988), a large framed four-colour offset poster of a hotel room, a white cardboard storage box titled “SCULPTURE DE VOYAGE”, and a coloured Plexiglas and chromium plated steel mural display case. 

The latter presents the Bond novel open to pages 120 and 121. If placed on a wall above head height, the pages can be deciphered from underneath, allowing the reader to discover a brutal scene in which famous villain, Le Chiffre, tortures agent 007. 

Graham returned to Bond as a source material a year later, with the Printed Matter/Art Metropole publication of Dr. No. 

"A typewritten sheet of instructions signed by the artist accompanies Casino Royale (Sculpture de voyage). In this text the artist describes the components of the work as follows: ‘1 copy of CASINO ROYALE by Ian Fleming (Coronet Books) / 1 display case comprising inner frame, stainless steel casing, 2 pcs colored plexiglass / 1 mounting plate / 3 screws / 1 screwdriver / 1 full color poster 90 x 57 cm’. 

The large, framed colour poster listed on the instruction sheet offers a view of a hotel room. A drawing of a shallow, rectangular box has been added to the image, as if fixed to the wall at the head of the bed. This is a representation of the second item on Graham’s list: a metal display case with top and underside made from two sheets of red, fluorescent Perspex. Resting inside the case is a copy of the novel Casino Royale by Ian Fleming (1908–1964), first published in 1953. This book, a paperback edition from 1988, lies open but face downwards. As the case is designed to be fixed to a wall, two pages of text (pages 120–1) can be read, albeit with some difficulty, from underneath. The passages on show describe a brutal and relentless beating suffered by the character James Bond at the hands of the book’s villain, Le Chiffre. 

The display case came with a white cardboard storage box, which is sometimes reproduced but not an integral part of the artwork as displayed. It was adapted from the box originally used by the suppliers of the Perspex, and is inscribed with the words ‘SCULPTURE DE VOYAGE’. As the work’s French subtitle – (Sculpture de voyage), or travel sculpture – ironically indicates, the display case is designed for use while travelling, and the screws and screwdriver that form part of the work are there to facilitate the mounting of the case, in accordance with Graham’s instruction sheet, on a wall above head height or over a bed or chair. The subtitle is a reference to the Sculpture de voyage (Sculpture for Travelling) 1918 by Marcel Duchamp (1887–1968), a hanging sculpture made from differently coloured

rubber strips cut from bathing caps, which is known only from contemporary photographs taken by the artist. Duchamp suspended this object in his studio in New York, tying it with strings to the four corners of the room. 

The rectangular box form of the display case, its industrially-inspired materials and projected mode of display jutting from a wall, suggest the wall-mounted ‘stack’ sculptures of Donald Judd (1928–94), for example, Untitled 1980 (Tate T03087) and Untitled 1990 (Tate T07951). Graham previously used this Judd-like form in Collected Papers 1988, a work comprising five wall-mounted boxes arranged in a uniform sequence (reproduced in Rodney Graham, exhibition catalogue, Vancouver Art Gallery, 1988, cover image). The boxes contain five volumes of the papers of Sigmund Freud (1856–1939). " 

- Tate.org

Fleming's first Bond novel has been thrice adapted for the screen. A year after it was published, CBS paid the author a thousand dollars to turn Casino Royale into a one-hour television episode of Climax!, featuring Barry Nelson as Jimmy Bond. Charles K. Feldman later acquired the rights to the novel and attempted to collaborate with Eon pictures to produce a film with Sean Connery reprising his role as Bond. When this proved untenable, Feldman sought to capitalize on the success of the series with a satirical version of Casino Royale. The 1967 film featured  Peter Sellers, Ursula Andress, David Niven, Orson Welles and Woody Allen. The British Film Institute called it "an incoherent all-star comedy".

It would be almost forty years until a 'canon' adaptation would be released: the Eon Productions 2006 film Casino Royale, which functioned as a franchise reboot, which introduced Daniel Craig as Bond. He returns today, for his fourth and final outing as 007, in No Time To Die.