20 Oct 2015

YYZBOOKS launches Hans Ulrich Obrist Hear Us featuring Bill Burns

Hans Ulrich Obrist Hear Us featuring Bill Burns is a book about life in the art world. The project ponders the relationship between the avant-garde, persona and celebrity under an advanced industrial regime. Under this regime, where production is increasingly disconnected from the material world, our role, it seems, is to perform commodity. Hans Ulrich Obrist Hear Us includes contributions by Bill Burns, as well as writers, Jennifer Allen, Dan Adler, and Dannys Montes de Oca Moreda with a foreword by Jennifer Matotek and Stuart Reid. It speculates on toadyism and brown-nosing with particular reference to contemporary art. It casts a critical eye on the conditions of art production as well as the catalogue of art history and hagiography. It poses critical questions about desire, belonging and the kind of world we want to live in. In short, it asks a question that has no answer: 'What do we long for?'

Hans-Ulrich Obrist Hear Us is a richly illustrated collection of writings exploring the transgressive and transdisciplinary nature of Burns' practice. The texts represent Burns' work across photography, performance, drawing and writing. The book is hardcover, 224 pages, with colour pictures throughout.

Please join YYZBOOKS at Art Toronto to celebrate the publication of this new book. The event will include a conversation between Bill Burns, curator Peggy Gale, and critic David Balzer. The conversation will be introduced by writer Carmen Victor. The book is published by YYZ BOOKS, Toronto and Black Dog Publishing, London. The launch will take place on Friday October 23, 2015 at 5:00PM at Art Toronto.

About the Contributors:

Bill Burns is an artist and writer. He has published more than a dozen artists' books and produced conceptual ruminations at the Museum of Modern Art, New York and the ICA, London. Dan Adler is an author and associate professor of modern and contemporary art at York University in Toronto. Dannys Montes de Oca Moreda is a researcher, curator, and art critic based in Havana. Jennifer Allen is a writer and critic living in Berlin. Jennifer Matotek is the Director/Curator of the Dunlop Art Gallery in Regina.
Stuart Reid is Director/Curator of Rodman Hall at Brock University in St Catharines.

About the Speakers:

Peggy Gale is a curator and writer whose texts on contemporary art have become artistic benchmarks. In 2014 she was a member of the curatorial team of the Bienale de Montréal. David Balzer is an author and critic. Dave Hickey has called his new book, Curationism: How Curating Took Over the Art World and Everything Else (Coach House Press/Pluto Press (Toronto and London 2014)), 'A good read, if you don't mind reading things that you don't want to know.'