MTU Cork Library Catalogue

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The possible life of Christian Boltanski / Christian Boltanski, Catherine Grenier ; translated from the French by Marc Lowenthal and with a foreword by Luc Sante.

By: Boltanski, Christian, 1944- [author].
Contributor(s): Grenier, Catherine [author].
Material type: materialTypeLabelBookPublisher: Boston : MFA Publications, [2009]Copyright date: ©2009Edition: 1st American edition.Description: 239 pages, [16] pages of plates : illustrations (some colour) ; 21 cm.Content type: text Media type: unmediated Carrier type: volumeISBN: 9780878467464 (hardback); 0878467467.Uniform titles: Vie possible de Christian Boltanski. English Subject(s): Boltanski, Christian, 1944- -- Interviews | Artists -- France -- BiographyDDC classification: 709.2 BOL
Contents:
Foreword / Luc Sante -- 1. Childhood -- 2. Becoming an artist -- 3. Making a splash -- 4. Personal mythologies -- 5. An idea that means a lot to me -- 6. Shaking things up -- 7. Beautiful photographs -- 8. Miracle of success -- 9. All saints -- 10. Between the trivial and the dramatic -- 11. An artist's life -- 12. Artistic affinities -- 13. Dark years -- 14. Before dying -- 15. Life of works -- 16. Tell the truth? -- 17. Catalogue raisonné.
Summary: 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 capital document about the nature and experience of art.
Holdings
Item type Current library Call number Status Date due Barcode Item holds
General Lending MTU Crawford College of Art and Design Library Lending 709.2 BOL (Browse shelf(Opens below)) Available 00231107
Total holds: 0

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

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.

"French voices"--Colophon.

Originally published in French as: La vie possible de Christian Boltanski. Paris : Editions du Seuil, 2007.

Foreword / Luc Sante -- 1. Childhood -- 2. Becoming an artist -- 3. Making a splash -- 4. Personal mythologies -- 5. An idea that means a lot to me -- 6. Shaking things up -- 7. Beautiful photographs -- 8. Miracle of success -- 9. All saints -- 10. Between the trivial and the dramatic -- 11. An artist's life -- 12. Artistic affinities -- 13. Dark years -- 14. Before dying -- 15. Life of works -- 16. Tell the truth? -- 17. Catalogue raisonné.

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 capital document about the nature and experience of art.

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