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Cover of David Robilliard Notebooks 1983-1988

Rob Tufnell

David Robilliard Notebooks 1983-1988

David Robilliard

€32.00

This book follows the first exhibition of Robilliard’s notebooks, ‘Disorganised Writings and Sketches’ with Rob Tufnell in Cologne in April 2019. It was made with support from the Elephant Trust and the book’s designers, A Practice for Everyday Life and with assistance from James Birch, one of David’s gallerists, and Chris Hall, custodian of the estate of Andrew Heard. The book is dedicated to Andrew Heard.

Rob Tufnell presents a new publication of extracts from the notebooks of the poet and artist David Robilliard (b.1952 – d.1988). After his premature death from an AIDS-related illness in 1988, Robilliard left a large number of notebooks in the care of his close friend and fellow artist Andrew Heard. These were obsessively filled with drafts of poems, diary entries, addresses and telephone numbers, blunt observations, quiet reflections, short stories, ideas for paintings, portraits and crude drawings. Robilliard’s superficially simple, pithy prose and verse is riddled with the dichotomies of an era that was both exuberant and miserable. His notebooks reveal his creative process, his interests, ideas, ambitions and then his illness but always embody his often repeated belief that ‘Life’s not good it’s excellent.’ 

Many of the books contain the inscription: ‘If found please return to 12 Fournier Street, London E1. Thank you’ – the home and studio of his patrons, Gilbert & George. In their lament ‘Our David’ (1990) they describe their protégé as: 

“...the sweetest, kindest, most infuriating, artistic, foul-mouthed, witty, sexy, charming, handsome, thoughtful, unhappy, loving and friendly person we ever met... Starting with pockets filled with disorganised writings and sketches, he went on to produce highly original poetry, drawings and paintings.”

The publication exists in two editions: yellow and pink.

recommendations

Cover of Sacred Spells: Collected Works

Nightboat Books

Sacred Spells: Collected Works

Assotto Saint

Poetry €23.00

The collected life-work of an interdisciplinary writer, performer, and central figure in the Black Gay cultural arts and AIDS movements.

In this timely collection of poetry, plays, fiction, and performance texts, Assotto Saint draws upon music and incantation, his Haitian heritage, and a politics of liberation to weaves together a tapestry of literature that celebrates life in the face of death. Influential to contemporary writers such as Essex Hemphill, Marlon Riggs, and Melvin Dixon, Sacred Spells is Saint’s crucial legacy–five hundred incandescent pages of painful, lyric writing that exemplifies the visceral, spiritual dimensions of an artistic practice that’s integral to Black and LGBTQ activist movements worldwide, both historic and present.

Cover of Issue 9: John Akomfrah

Plaster Magazine

Issue 9: John Akomfrah

John Akomfrah

This special, limited-edition issue of Plaster celebrates Akomfrah’s commission for the British Pavilion at the 60th International Art Exhibition, La Biennale di Venezia. The linen presentation box contains: an essay by Akomfrah’s long-time friend and collaborator, the BAFTA-winning film curator June Givanni; an interview with Akomfrah by Harriet Lloyd-Smith; original portraits by photographer Siam Coy and a fold-out poster featuring an exclusive still from Akomfrah’s film installation, Listening All Night To The Rain, now screening in the British Pavilion at the Venice Biennale.

With creative direction by Constantine // Spence and design by Emma Ralph.

Cover of Presence Detection System

Hiding Press

Presence Detection System

Nora Fulton

Poetry €16.00

Presence Detection System is a collection of presence detection systems written between 19015 and 19017 by my mother’s daughter. Its composition was marked by the many things we came to violently disagree about, and it was thought, back then, that an abandonment of comparison could be the only way out. For example, we disagreed and disagree about whether to call what we call ourselves ‘misprisions.’ We disagreed and disagree about where to drape our lone antimacassar, how to clean it, who made it, etc. We disagreed and disagree about what is and isn’t an instance of gambling, which itself is, my mother would joke, “a kind of wager labour.” We even disagreed and disagree about love, even though we experience it, talk about it, act upon it and theorize it in exactly the same way.

Nora Collen Fulton is a poet living in Montreal. Her first book, Life Experience Coolant, was published by Bookthug. Presence Detection System is her second collection of poems, and her third, Thee Display, is forthcoming next year through the Documents Series, co-produced by the Center for Expanded Poetics and Anteism Books. She currently occupies herself with doctoral studies; her research attempts to apply debates in philosophy regarding the relationship between ontology and mathematics to the ontological stakes of trans studies.

Cover of ztscript 33 : Lisa Fittko

ztscript

ztscript 33 : Lisa Fittko

ztscript

Typeface by Bea Schlingelhoff, from the Project "Women against Hitler"

Eric Bell & Kristoffer Frick: Rainbow Rope, 2017 1, Crystal Table (II), 2017 2, 63, Platonic Solid, 2018 64, Kolumne 3, Sara MacKillop: WC2N 4, 10, 15, 24, California Cannabis Legalization 9, Letzte Ausgabe der Spartakusbriefe, Oktober 1918 11, Delia Gonzales 16-21, Cordula Daus 22, Christina Irrgang 25, Eric Ellingsen 26, Hugo Canoilas: L’ô 29, 30, 35-38, Sadie Plant 31, Markus Krottendorfer: aus der Serie TERMINAL, 2017 32, Kate Rich: Feral Trade 39, Julia Knass 44, Walter Hetzer: World Trade Center 1972 46, Lidl, Wiedner Hauptstraße 15, Wien (ehemals Generali Foundation, gebaut 1993-95, Architektur Jabornegg & Pálffy) 50, One Hour and a Half in the Life of Ztscrpt 62-52

Cover of Having a party (hope you will be there)

Damien & The Love Guru

Having a party (hope you will be there)

Mickael Marman

Photography €15.00

"Having a party (hope you will be there)", is a catalogue of an exhibition organized by Mickael Marman and D&TLG at CFAlive in Milan with artists from the black European diaspora, including original contributions, photos of the show, as well as a brand new intro text by Olamiju Fajemisin.