Œuvres complètes, 1993
GPE-0093
Lithograph
Arches Velin BFK Rives 270 g
Two plates 31 x 23 cm each folded, 62.5 x 92.3 cm each open
Signed on the colophon: “Giulio Paolini”
Printed numbering on the colophon
108 in Arabic numerals from 1/108 to 108/108
20 H.C. in Arabic numerals from I/XX to XX/XX
10 E.A. in Arabic numerals from EA 1 to EA 10
9 ad personam
3 E.A. in Arabic numerals from EA 1 to EA 3 with a collage
Yvon Lambert, Paris
Atelier du Livre de l’Imprimerie nationale, Flers en Escrebieux
The book is part of the series Une rêverie émanée de mes loisirs created by the Paris art dealer and publisher Yvon Lambert in 1992. Initiated with Robert Barry, continued with Giulio Paolini, Christian Boltanski, Jean-Michel Othoniel, On Kawara, Lawrence Weiner, Paul-Armand Gette, Anselm Kiefer, and in the 2000s with other artists, the series included thirty titles until 2023; the name of the series comes from a text by Jean-Claude Lebensztejn, literary co-author of most of the first volumes. The publications share a box-like container, edition size, and – with a few rare exceptions – the association between a literary text and the artist's work.
Cloth-covered box with reproduction in negative of some details of Paolini's contribution, 34.5 x 26 x 4.8 cm. Contains two sheets folded twice, respectively with the text by Jean-Claude Lebensztejn and the print by Giulio Paolini, and five bi-folios: the first one serves as a general title-page, the second one as a title-page for the text by Lebensztejn, the third one as a title-page for the work by Paolini, the fourth one with the colophon, the fifth one with the imprint date and details concerning the printer.
Includes information regarding the publisher, text by Lebensztejn, printer, type of paper, Paolini's intervention, author of the photographs reproduced (Paolo Mussat Sartor), and edition size. Printed numbering at the bottom centre, signature of both authors at the bottom, respectively to the left (Lebensztejn) and right (Paolini).
The book/multiple includes two large-format sheets folded into quarters, with one featuring a text by Jean-Claude Lebensztejn1 and the other a contribution by Giulio Paolini. Paolini's sheet reproduces several photographs of the same white sheet at different moments of its folding, so that by opening and closing the sheet, the sides and folds that are leafed through are gradually reproduced.2 In addition, each side on the photographic sheet bears the inscription of one of the letters in the title, in autograph calligraphy, in one of the two lower corners. That way, their reading, in the order of the pages of the folded sheet to make up an untouched sixteenth, traces each of the sixteen parts of the sheet. In the artist's words: "The sixteen letters of the title mark, one by one, the sixteen parts of a sheet that, folded precisely in 'sixteenths,' evokes the 'text' of the pages that is thus constituted."3
The key to interpretation lies in the paradox between the resounding announcement of the title – the French words indicate the complete works of an author – and the succession of blank pages of the folded sheet, limited to the the spelling of the sides that constitute it. The completeness promised by the title is thus resolved in the exhaustiveness with which the sheet presents itself. Broadly speaking, the idea of a work that includes all existing works recalls the typically Paolinian concept of the work as a potential container or as the potential of a definition.
1 The text of the French art historian, titled Une rèverie émanée de mes loisirs, sketches out a 'history of the arts' from the standpoint of the practice of appropriation and cross-referencing in it various expressions (from plagiarism to piracy), with numerous literary, artistic and philosophical references.
2 The black and white photographs were taken by Paolo Mussat Sartor.
3 G. Paolini, note to the multiple, in Quattro passi. Nel museo senza muse (Turin: Giulio Einaudi editore, 2006), p. 85.
| 1993-94 | Paris, Galerie Yvon Lambert, Des livres.... Une rêverie émanée de mes loisirs. Jean-Claude Lebensztejin, 17 November 1993 - 15 January 1994. |
| 1995 | Lisbon, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian / Centro de Arte Moderna José de Azeredo Perdigão, Giulio Paolini. Impressions graphiques. Múltiplos e Obra Gráfica 1969-1995, 16 March - 28 May, not repr. in the exhibition brochure (catalogue Impressions graphiques. L’opera grafica 1967-1992 di Giulio Paolini [Turin: Marco Noire Editore, 1992], update supplement 1992-95, cat. no. 93). |
| 1996 | Apolda, Kunsthaus Apolda Avantgarde, Giulio Paolini. Impressions graphiques, 27 September - 27 October (catalogue Impressions graphiques. L’opera grafica 1967-1992 di Giulio Paolini [Turin: Marco Noire Editore, 1992], update supplement 1992-95, cat. no. 93). |
| 1997 | Göppingen, Kunsthalle, Giulio Paolini. Impressions graphiques. Das graphische Druckwerk 1967-1995, 9 March - 13 April (catalogue Impressions graphiques. L’opera grafica 1967-1992 di Giulio Paolini [Turin: Marco Noire Editore, 1992], update supplement 1992-95, cat. no. 93). |
| 2001 | Strasbourg, CEAAC Centre Européen d’Actions Artistiques Contemporaines, Giulio Paolini, 13 October - 23 December, no catalogue. |
| 2002 | Modena, Biblioteca civica d’arte Luigi Poletti, Giulio Paolini. Pagine, 20 September - 23 November, repr. pp. 86-87 (caption p. 94), referred to in the text by M. Bertoni pp. 15-16. |
| 2006 | Rivoli, Castello di Rivoli Museo d'Arte Contemporanea, Libri Books Bücher, 29 April - 30 July, no catalogue. |
| 2013 | Vence, Château de Villeneuve, Fondation Émile Hugues, La fabrique d'une collection, 2 March - 12 May, no catalogue. |
| 2014 | Vence, Château de Villeneuve, Fondation Émile Hugues, Intime conviction. Œuvres de la collection de Giuliana et Tommaso Setari, 14 June - 30 November, cited in the checklist of exhibited works p. 58. |
| • | G. Paolini, “Le sedici lettere...”, in Id., Quattro passi. Nel museo senza muse (Turin: Giulio Einaudi editore, 2006), p. 85. |
| • | Giulio Paolini. Impressions graphiques, l’opera grafica (Turin: Marco Noire Editore, 1995), update supplement 1992-95 to the volume Impressions graphiques. L’opera grafica 1967-1992 di Giulio Paolini (Turin: Marco Noire Editore, 1992), cat. no. 93, col. repr. |
| • | L. Dematteis, G. Maffei, Libri d’artista in Italia 1960-1998 (Turin: Regione Piemonte, 1998), cat. no. 2099 p. 179, not repr. |
| • | G. Paolini, Quattro passi. Nel museo senza muse (Turin: Giulio Einaudi editore, 2006), p. 85 (note by the artist Le sedici lettere...), repr. |
