Marc Quinn: Memory Box

Sculptures, paintings, and other art objects by one of the most original Young British Artists in an unparalleled exhibition catalog. Published on the occasion of the exhibition at the 55th Venice Biennale, this catalog gathers a number of works by this renowned British artist. It is “a journey from the origins of life” that, according to the artist, through very powerful works celebrates “the awe and wonder of the world in which we live.”

Marc Quinn began his career exploring issues such as the relationship between art and science, the human body and its survival mechanisms, life and its preservation, and beauty and death. Through an interview of the artist with the editor Germano Celant, the volume offers in-depth insight into Quinn's conceptual practice, which incorporates sculpture, painting, and installations. The artist's preoccupation with the metamorphic ability of both human life and nature points to his fascination with our innate spirituality. Quinn questions the codes of nature through his adoption of uncompromising materials, such as ice, blood, marble, glass, and lead. Through the use of such materials, his works are at once poetic and confrontational and explore life, death, sexuality, and religion. Quinn transforms the very act of seeing by forcing viewers to question what is around them, pushing them into the unknown in order to rediscover life.

Internationally known for his writings on Arte Povera, Germano Celant has been a contributing editor at Artforum since 1977 and at Interview since 1991. The director of Fondazione Prada, Milan, since 1995, Celant is also curator of Fondazione Aldo Rossi in Milan and of Fondazione Emilio e Annabianca Vedova in Venice.