Rirkrit Tiravanija, On Making Less, design: Studio Santiago da Silva, 2024, photo: Luis Kürschner
The Practice – What Moves Artists
New Book Series
The Practice – What Moves Artists is a new book series by Gropius Bau, that invites artists to showcase a practice that they pursue, that has influenced them or that has been with them for a long time. Playing, thinking, gardening or collectively founding a band: In an artist’s practice, such seemingly incidental activities can be grasped as productive processes – as a way of establishing relationships, of reflecting on how we want to live.
In The Practice artists use the 128 pages as a small exhibition space or artist book to share with us what moves them. The book series is edited by Jenny Schlenzka and Julia Grosse.
Volume 1: On Making Less
By Rirkrit Tiravanija
Making less may seem contradictory considering climate change, turbo-capitalism and political gridlock. Yet for Rirkrit Tiravanija, it is a crucial practice that has shaped him for many years and has rarely seemed as relevant as it does right now: using fewer resources; intervening less and observing more; looking less at results and more at the process. It can also mean collecting fewer objects in museums or accumulating fewer artworks in galleries and instead using these spaces for cooking, playing table tennis or spending the night. For Tiravanija as an artist, it can even mean deciding not to make art at all and instead renting a rice field to collectively test methods of sustainable energy production. Or it can mean simply waiting to see what happens.
In this book, Rirkrit Tiravanija compiles various ideas and approaches to this method on 128 pages, including an essay from the 1970s about “Do-Nothing Farming” by Masanobu Fukuoka, a pioneer of today’s organic farming. He also shares a fast recipe for a Negroni, a slow recipe for fish sauce and instructions for composting and provides insights into his process-oriented work.
The book is also available on site at the Walther König bookshop in the Gropius Bau.
Author: Rirkrit Tiravanija
Title: On Making Less
Series title: The Practice – What Moves Artists
Editors: Jenny Schlenzka & Julia Grosse
ISBN: 978-3-948546-24-3
Publisher: Bierke Verlag
Price: €10
Format: 12 x 16 cm
Design: Studio Santiago da Silva
Volume 2: On Dangerous Grounds
By Vaginal Davis, Bibbe Hansen, Felix Knoke
The artist Vaginal Davis certainly moves on dangerous ground with her transgressive shuffling of gender and genre boundaries. The self-described “sexual repulsive” co-founded several art/punk bands in her expansive 40-year-plus career, namely Afro Sisters, ¡Cholita!, Pedro, Muriel & Esther (PME), black fag and Tenderloin. As a writer and “Whoracle et Delphi”, Ms. Davis turns her quirky hairy eyeball to the collective practice of making music in the saucy underground scenes of Los Angeles and Berlin. In their contributions, longtime comrades and collaborators Bibbe Hansen (artist and Warhol Silver Factory habitué) and Felix Knoke (guest performer for The Hidden Cameras and band member of Tenderloin) rave about joint performances and rehearsals, divulging sacred secrets and rifts. Bruce “Judy” LaBruce, Glen Meadmore and Lisa “Suckdog” Carver make surprise guest appearances, along with images from live performance spectacles The White to Be Angry, Trust Fund, Interracial Dating Game, We’re Taking Over, Afro De Sade and Camp/Anti-Camp: A Queer Guide to Everyday Life.
Coming soon
The book will soon be available in our webshop and at the Walther König bookshop at Gropius Bau.
Author: Vaginal Davis, Bibbe Hansen, Felix Knoke
Title: On Dangerous Grounds
Series title: The Practice – What Moves Artists
Editors: Jenny Schlenzka & Julia Grosse
Publisher: Bierke Verlag
Price: €10
Format: 12 x 16 cm
Design: Studio Santiago da Silva