"Public Workshop and Setting" in Zak Kyes Working with... (ed. Zak Kyes) Berlin: Sternberg Press,...

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233 in contemporary art, see Nicolas Bourriaud, Post- production (Berlin: Lukas & Sternberg, 2002). 9. El Lissitzky, quoted in Matthew Drutt, “El Lissitzky in Germany 19221925,” in El Lissitzky: Beyond the “Abstract Cabi - net,” ed. Margarita Tupitsyn (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1999), 22. 10. Frederick Kiesler, Inter- nationale Ausstellung neuer Theatertechnik (Vienna: Kunsthandlung Würthle & Sohn, 1924), xx. 11. Yves Klein, lecture, Sorbonne, 1959, reprinted in Yves Klein 19281962: A Retrospective (Houston, TX: Institute for the Arts, Rice University, 1982), 225. 12. For an interview with the designers about the project, see Adam Kleinman, “Dexter Sinister,” Bombsite (March 2008), accessed March 2012, http://bomb- site.com/issues/999/arti- cles/3117. 13. Peter Bil’ak, “Concept” (2006), accessed March 2012, http://www.peterbi- lak.com/graphic_design_in_ the_white_cube/concept. html. 14. Zak Kyes and Mark Owens, eds., Forms of Inquiry: The Architecture of Critical Graphic Design (London: Architectural Association, 2007), 12. 15. Ibid., 11. ZAK KYES WORKING WITH232 Can Altay Public Workshop and Setting, 2012 The fictitious title of artist Can Altay’s workshop and installation of two stacking tables, Leipzig Papers: Wessel von Gegnung, suggest the potential for a space to be a vessel for encounter. A daylong workshop involving twelve participants took place around the tables, and ephemera from the workshop was displayed on the tables for the duration of the exhibition. The workshop, conducted in English, took place on February 1, 2012, at 10:00 a.m. This new work relates to an earlier workshop, Publishing Class, by Altay and Zak Kyes, organized by Casco – Office for Art, Design and Theory, Utrecht, in 2011.

Transcript of "Public Workshop and Setting" in Zak Kyes Working with... (ed. Zak Kyes) Berlin: Sternberg Press,...

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in contemporary art, see Nicolas Bourriaud, Post-production (Berlin: Lukas

& Sternberg, 2002). 9. El Lissitzky, quoted in Matthew Drutt, “El Lissitzky in Germany 1922– 1925,” in El Lissitzky: Beyond the “Abstract Cabi-

net,” ed. Margarita Tupitsyn (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1999), 22.

10. Frederick Kiesler, Inter-nationale Ausstellung neuer Theatertechnik (Vienna: Kunsthandlung Würthle

& Sohn, 1924), xx. 11. Yves Klein, lecture,

Sorbonne, 1959, reprinted in Yves Klein 1928–1962:

A Retrospective (Houston, TX: Institute for the Arts, Rice University, 1982), 225.

12. For an interview with the designers about the project, see Adam Kleinman,

“Dexter Sinister,” Bombsite (March 2008), accessed March 2012, http://bomb-site.com/issues/999/arti-cles/3117.

13. Peter Bil’ak, “Concept” (2006), accessed March 2012, http://www.peterbi-lak.com/graphic_design_in_the_white_cube/concept.html.

14. Zak Kyes and Mark Owens, eds., Forms of Inquiry:

The Architecture of Critical Graphic Design (London: Architectural Association, 2007), 12.

15. Ibid., 11.

z a k k y e s wo r k i n g w i t h …

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Can AltayPublic Workshop and Setting, 2012

The fictitious title of artist Can Altay’s workshop and installation of two stacking tables, Leipzig Papers: Wessel von Gegnung, suggest the potential for a space to be a vessel for encounter. A daylong workshop involving twelve participants took place around the tables, and ephemera from the workshop was displayed on the tables for the duration of the exhibition. The workshop, conducted in English, took place on February 1, 2012, at 10:00 a.m. This new work relates to an earlier workshop, Publishing Class, by Altay and Zak Kyes, organized by Casco – Office for Art, Design and Theory, Utrecht, in 2011.

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Workshop, 2011

The brief from a previous workshop by Can Altay and Zak Kyes was expanded and revised for the exhibition. As such, the brief is both a trace of an earlier collabo-ration and a future proposition articulating common areas of interest in which the practices of an artist and graphic designer overlap. Participants were invited to deve-lop a discursive proposal that addressed questions of display and making-public such that writing, editing, and designing would be combined.

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Biographies

CAN ALTAY is an artist living in Istanbul. His installations of videos, mappings, books, and photographs incorporate different forms of research on the urban environment. Altay studies improvised architectures in the city, as well as hidden structures of support, unauthorized systems of organization, and models of cohabitation. He further inves-tigates the production of ideas and notions of public space through “setting a setting”: a body of work where he proposes spaces and constructs for gatherings. The clashes and overlaps between function and meaning and unpredictable reconfigurations within systems are some of his main interests. Altay has had solo exhibitions at Casco, Utrecht (2011); The Showroom, London (2010); Künst-lerhaus Bethanien, Berlin (2008); Sala Rekalde, Bilbao (2006); and Spike Island, Bristol (2007). His work has been included in the Istanbul, Havana, Busan, Gwangju, and Taipei Biennials; and in museums and galleries such as the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; Van Abbemuseum,

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artists Jane and Louise Wilson he made the film Face Scripting, which debuted at the 2011 Sharjah Biennial. He directs the cultural pro-gram at the Architectural Association, London, where he co-curated the audio exhibition

“Translated By” (2011) and launched a new “live magazine” titled Format: The Shapes of Discourse.

RICHARD BIRKETT is curator at Artists Space, New York. Since 2010 he has co-curated exhibitions with Artists Space director Stefan Kalmár, including “Mark Morrisroe: From This Moment On” (2011) and “‘Identity’” (2011). Previously he was curator at the Insti-tute of Contemporary Arts, London, curat-ing projects including “Chto Delat? (What is to be done?) – The Urgent Need to Strug-gle” (2010), “Calling Out of Context” (with Jamie Eastman, 2009), “Talk Show” (with Will Holder and Jennifer Thatcher, 2009), and “Nought to Sixty” (2008). He has contributed texts to artists’ monographs and art periodi-cals, and edited publications including COSEY COMPLEX Book (with Maria Fusco, Verlag der Buchhandlung Walther König, 2012) and Dispersion (with Polly Staple, ICA, 2008).

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Eindhoven; Zentrum für Kunst und Medi-entechnologie Karlsruhe; MoMA PS1, New York; and Platform Garanti, Istanbul.

CHARLES ARSèNE-HENRY is a writer and editor based in London. Arsène-Henry founded White Box Black Box, a specula-tive agency exploring formats of research and fiction. In 2011 he co-curated the exhibi-tion “Translated By” at the Architectural Association, London, where he teaches the media studies seminar Shapes of Fiction. With the Luma Foundation, he is currently conceiving The Library Is on Fire.

SHUMON BASAR is a writer and curator based in London. He is currently working on his first novel, titled World!World!World!. Basar is coeditor of Cities from Zero (Archi-tectural Assocation, 2007), With/Without (Bidoun, 2007), Did Someone Say Participate? (MIT Press, 2006), and Hans Ulrich Obrist Interviews: Volume 2 (Charta Art, 2010), and is a contributing editor to Bidoun and Tank magazines, as well as cofounder of Sexyma-chinery. With architect Eyal Weizman and

c o l o p h o n

Zak Kyes Working With…Published by Sternberg Press

Editors: Zak Kyes and Barbara SteinerEditorial Assistant: Airi TriisbergCopyeditor: Leah Whitman-SalkinProofreader: Max BachDesigner: Wayne DalyPrinting: GGP Media GmbH

Typefaces: Dear Sir/Madam, Dear Wall, and Dearest by Radim PeškoEdition: 1,000

ISBN 978-1-934105-92-4

© 2012 the authors and Sternberg Press. All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

Sternberg PressCaroline SchneiderKarl-Marx-Allee 78

D-10243 Berlinwww.sternberg-press.com

Focusing on the conceptual, visual, and economic intersections implicit in design today, Zak Kyes Working With… expands collaborative form from a pragmatic structure of working together to the joint development of content. In this sense,

“working with” could be seen as a method of negotiating heterogeneous content—content that is further broadened by the act of translating it into the spatial and visual settings of an exhibition and a publication. Here, works by Zak Kyes, as well as works commissioned for the expanded project—collaborations with architects, artists, writers, curators, and other graphic designers—explore how graphic design today is a practice that both mediates and is mediated by its allied disciplines.

I S B N 978 -1- 9 3 410 5 - 9 2- 4