Endre Tót Total questions by Tot

Endre Tót

Total questions by Tot

Berlin, Germany: Edition Hundertmark, 1974

16 pp., 21 x 14.7 cm., staple-bound

Edition of 300

The first booklet in the Hundertmark series consists of reproduction of questionnaires answered by Marina Abramovic, anonymous c/o Marylin Monroe, George Brecht, Jacques Charlier, Hervé Fisher, Ken Friedman, Dick Higgins, Pierre Restany, Takako Saito, Mieko Shiomi and Wolf Vostell, and not by Marcel Duchamp.

Tot posed five questions on a form titled "I'd Be Glad If You Answered My Questions". The form is marked "Please Print Clearly" but his questions are far from legible. Produced on a typewriter, many of the letters are obscured by other characters. And the final question is only a series of zeroes. 

The recipients replied in kind, either by leaving the fields blank or answering with rubber stamps (or in the case of Abramovic, postage stamps). Higgins and Friedman seem to try to answer in earnest, as may Mieko Shiomi, whose replies are in her native Japanese. 

The title was reprinted in 1981 in a second edition of 300 copies. These remain available from the publisher, here, for 16 Euro.

Printed Matter is currently presenting an exhibition of Tót's work titled Endre Tót : Gladness and Rain.

Curated by Darling Green, the exhibition features over 100 items, including artists’ books, printed matter, performance works, and mail art correspondence, with an emphasis on the Hungarian artist's printed output of the 1970s and 80s, which defied the censorship of Soviet-controlled Hungary with humour and absurdity.

The exhibition is billed as "the most comprehensive collection of Tót’s work ever shown in the US". It closes in one week, on November 14th.