Devised for Château La Coste, Mater Earth takes us into the heart of humanity and the myths of creation. Prune Nourry created a monumental sculpture representing a pregnant work emerging from the earth, an immersive installation based on the principles of eco-responsible architecture. The work was first imagined back in 2010, when the artist invited a pregnant woman to pose in a bath of milk for a photography session. From those images of serenity, she created a life-size sculpture. Prune Nourry was instantly seized by a desire to produce a larger scale version of the work but it took several years of reflection before the desire became reality. The book follows the creation of the statue in situ, offering readers an original experience of symbolic rebirth. The work brings an inside view of the project and the mysteries of its conception, situating Mater Earth in Prune Nourry's rich and varied career. We see the stages of its development towards an ideal of "ultracollective chaos" involving multiple artists and artisans, as well as Prune Nourry's own ethical and ecological reflections and self-questioning. The work provides a rare vision of the gestation of creation, a window onto the creative process, showing everything that nourished the project and brought it to life. The illustrations resonate with this birthing process, creating a catalogue of the cultural and artistic motifs that inspired the work. Nancy Huston's journal provides sensitive, thoughtful insight into maternity, reflecting the slow metamorphosis of all works of creation.

This extensive volume uncovers Dali’s influences, artistic development, and legacy, offering unprecedented access inside the world of the man behind the mustache. Through astute analysis of Dali’s work and how the events of his time converged with his drive to become a legend, this volume examines one of the most significant contributors to twentieth-century art. Although recognized primarily as a painter, Dali experimented with a wide range of media. This comprehensive review includes the literature, photography, film, and sculpture that influenced and was created by Dali throughout his career, from paintings such as The Persistence of Memory, to the icons of the surrealist movement such as the Mae West Lips Sofa and the Lobster Telephone, to short film collaborations with Luis Buñuel. The author offers insight into this undisputed genius, charting Dali’s progression as an artist and controversial public figure, and demonstrating his influence on contemporary artists such as Warhol, Koons, and Murakami.

"I'm the pedlar of chimaeras, the pedlar of simian dreams, of arachnid deliriums...I'm the trickster, a trickster with overpainted photos, distorting enlargements, overprintings, out-of-focus close-ups, concatenated images, distorting lenses...I'm the teller of lies, the messenger of false premonitions, of dubious loves, of suspect memories, the woman who tames paper spiders..."--Annette Messager Annette Messager's original use of form and poetic power of communication place her among Europe's leading contemporary artists. Born and brought up in the small town of Berck in Northern France where "everybody made art," in the early 1960s she went to study at the Ecole des Arts Dé coratifs in Paris. There she quickly rejected any hierarchical notion of art form in favor of a freedom of expression inspired initially by Jean Dubuffet and the "outside" art he promoted. Since the late 1960s, she has experimented with and combined a wide variety of media, from painting and sculpture to assemblage, photograph, film and embroidery, often culminating in installations of great potency. Her work is at once intimate and universal, using familiar objects (toys, fishing nets, gloves) in a manner that challenges us to look at our comfortable world with fresh eyes. For this first monograph on Annette Messager, the author has worked closely with the artist to produce a strong, visual work that provides a clear picture of the creative development of a major artist working today. Fully illustrated, including a 34-page introductory portfolio featuring key installations, the book offers a thematically organized text incorporating first-hand interviews with the artist as well as analyses of thesignificance of individual works. Completed by a full exhibitions history and extensive bibliography," Annette Messager" is a must-read for anyone interested in current artistic developments in Europe.

Christian Boltanski's votive installations, archives and objects, revolving around the fragile polarities of memory and amnesia, identity and anonymity, have made him one of the world's most renowned contemporary artists. And yet, despite the centrality of biography and testimony to his work, Boltanski's own story is little known and has never been fully told. Published on the occasion of the artist's sixty-fifth birthday, The Possible Life of Christian Boltanski, written in the form of a book-length interview (which the artist likens to a "psychoanalysis" or "confession") with the art historian Catherine Grenier, is Boltanski's oral autobiography. In it, he recounts his unusual wartime childhood ("my mother hid my father under the floorboards. He stayed there for a year and a half, between two floors in the house. He'd come out from time to time--I'm living proof of that "), his career, friendships and marriage, successes and regrets, his approaches to art and teaching, how he created various installations, his relations with dealers and the public, and other matters that illuminate as never before his complex, enigmatic works. Boltanski is refreshingly phlegmatic about the realities of the world (art and otherwise), and he relates his remarkable stories--some enormously amusing, others tragic--with a matter-of-factness and self-deprecating humor that highlight his capacity for humane responsiveness. As both the self-portrait of a major contemporary artist and a frank, fascinating memoir, this is a document of capital importance.

Mona Hatoum works in a diverse and unconventional range of media, including installation, sculpture, video and photography, with her artistic practice discussed almost exclusively in sociopolitical terms. This richly illustrated monograph - which includes a number of full-page illustrations - explores Hatoum's unique visual aesthetic and brings other influences to the surface, notably Surrealism (the first Western art Hatoum discovered as a young girl) and Minimalism (the dominant aesthetic she encountered in art school in London). In exploring these seemingly contradictory impulses, this volume uncovers artistic and personal concerns that go beyond a simple journalistic reading of Hatoum's artistic practice.

An exploration of the influential artist's mysterious painted worlds.