Marcel Broodthaers - by Christophe Cherix & Manuel Borja-Villel (Hardcover)

About the Book

Catalog of an exhibition held at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York, February 14-May 15, 2016, the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofaia, Madrid, Spain, October 4, 2016-January 9, 2017, and the Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, Deusseldorf, Germany, March 4-June 11, 2017.

Book Synopsis

The catalog for the Museum of Modern Art's acclaimed Broodthaer's exhibition

Marcel Broodthaers' extraordinary artistic output placed him at the center of international activity during the transformative decades of the 1960s and 1970s. Throughout his career, from early objects variously made of mussel shells, eggshells and books of his own poetry, to his most ambitious project, the Musée d'Art Moderne, Département des Aigles (Museum of Modern Art, Department of Eagles), and the Décors made at the end of his life, Broodthaers occupied a unique position, often operating as both innovator and commentator. Setting a precedent for what we call installation art today, his work has had a profound influence on a broad range of contemporary artists, and he remains vitally relevant to cultural discourse at large. Published to accompany Broodthaers' first retrospective in New York, this volume examines the artist's work across all mediums. Essays by the exhibition organizers Christophe Cherix and Manuel Borja-Villel, along with a host of major scholars, including Benjamin H.D. Buchloh, Jean François Chevrier, Thierry de Duve and Doris Krystof, provide historical and theoretical context for the artist's work. The book also features new translations of many of Broodthaers' texts.

Marcel Broodthaers (1924-76) worked as a poet and critic until the age of 40, when he declared himself a visual artist. Over the next 12 years, he moved between Brussels, his birth city, and Düsseldorf and London. From 1968 to 1972 Broodthaers operated the Musée d'Art Moderne, Département des Aigles, an itinerant museum devoted to the exploration of the role of the institution itself and the function of art in society.

Review Quotes

clarifying... [it is] ambivalence, rather than militancy, that sets Broodthaers apart.--Chloe Wyman "Artspace"

gives the breadth of his art room to breathe.--Ben Davis "Artnet.com"

[An] all-around provocateur who parodied the institutional qualities of a museum by creating one of his own... Acute awareness of the creative process... informs Broodthaers's entire oeuvre.--Albert Mobilio "Bookforum"

Broodthaers at his closest to poetry looks both ways, caught between love of the past and fear of the present.--John Haber "Haber's Art Reviews"

Broodthaers created his own context for experiencing his work. This expansive and generously illustrated catalog, which accompanied a recent retrospective, is useful for gaining a better understanding of this mysterious and multifarious artist, whose productions and preoccupations have become increasingly central to the history of modern art.--Jeff Jackson "Fanzine"

Evident throughout... is the artist's insistent message that formal decorum conceals and often intentionally occludes the power of real truths, and that the poet/artist has the key to unlock those verities by playfully rearranging the representational signifiers of cultural capital.--Tom McGlynn "Brooklyn Rail"

MOMA's near-definitive account of the work of Broodthaers was a standout among standouts, providing a rare opportunity to consider firsthand the labyrinthine imagination of the twentieth century's most elusive and enigmatic artist-poet.--Matthew Higgs "Artforum, Best of 2016"