Possible Life of Christian Boltanski (SIGNED by Christian Boltanski: First American Edition & Printing)

BOLTANSKI, Christian / Catherine Grenier (editor) & Luc Sante (contributor)

ISBN 10: 0878467467 / ISBN 13: 9780878467464

Published by MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS BOSTON, 2009, 2009

About this Item

This copy is hand SIGNED by Christian Boltanski; First American Edition and First Printing on acid-free paper; 239pp numbered pages or 256pp with the illustrations, 3 color & 13 b&w illustrations, 5-½ x 8in.; "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 contemporyary artists. Yet, his own story is little known. Here, in the form of a book-length interview, he recounts his unusual wartime childhood - including "episodes of family life that could have been drawn from a novel" - his career, friendships and marriage, successes and regrets, his approaches to art and teaching, how he created various installations, his relationships with dealers & the public, and other matters illuminating his works."; PROVENANCE: Sept. 2009 book signing at Strand Bookstore (on front dustjacket is Strand's removeable sticker stating "A STRAND SIGNED COPY); hardboards with black cloth spine, dustjacket has just a little rubbing and a few small creases, otherwise boards and interior pages in EXCELLENT COND.

Seller Inventory # 6385

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Possible Life of Christian Boltanski (SIGNED by Christian Boltanski: First American Edition & Printing)
• Publisher: MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS BOSTON, 2009
• Publication Date: 2009
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0878467467
• ISBN 13: 9780878467464
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: 1st Edition
• Condition: As New
• Signed: Signed by Author(s)
• Seller catalogs:
  • MODERN AND CONTEMPORARY ARTISTS BOOKS

About this title

Synopsis

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.