Hack Wit

The art of Roni Horn (born 1955) often revolves around language, poetry and literature. She works with literary texts, by authors such as the French philosopher Hélène Cixous and the Canadian poet Anne Carson. This volume shows a series of drawings, Hack Wit, developed between 2013 and 2015, in which Horn cuts up English figures of speech such as clichés and proverbs. For each work, the artist made two watercolors of a different proverb, cut them apart and then combined them into one. The result is a wild poetry that dances between meaning and absurdity, recognition and novelty. Anne Carson contributes a text, "Hack Gloss," in response to the Hack Wit drawings.

Roni Horn's work urges us to see the unfamiliar in familiar materials and phenomena. (Michael Miller Bookforum)