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Writings by the conceptual artist Michael Asher—including notes, proposals, exhibition statements, and letters to curators and critics—most published here for the first time.The California conceptual artist Michael Asher (1943-2012) was known for rigorous site specificity and pioneering institutional critique. His decades of teaching at CalArts influenced generations of artists. Much of Asher's artistic practice was devoted to creating works that had no lasting material presence and often responded to the material, social, or ideological context of a situation. Because most of Asher's artworks have ceased to exist, his writings about them have special significance. Public Knowledge collects writings by Asher about his work—including preliminary notes and ideas, project proposals, exhibition statements, and letters to curators and critics—most of which have never been previously published. Asher gave few interviews, didn't write art criticism, and rarely published extensive accounts of his own work. Yet writing was central to his artistic practice, serving as a tool for working out ideas, negotiating institutional parameters, and describing thought processes. In these texts, he considers writing and documentation, discusses artistic practice, offers notes for gallery and museum talks, presents artist statements for exhibition-goers, describes individual works and their situational context, and reflects on teaching and art education. Among other things, Asher provides his definition of site specificity, addresses the function of art in public space, and analyzes the intersection of teaching art and institutional models of education. Readers will see an artist at work, formulating ethical and political strategies for making art in a situational world.

The most comprehensive collection to date of the artist Bruce Nauman's writings plus all of his major interviews from 1965 to 2001.

In 2006, even though he could barely type, China¿s most famous artist started blogging. For more than three years, Ai Weiwei turned out a steady stream of scathing social commentary, criticism of government policy, thoughts on art and architecture, and autobiographical writings. He wrote about the Sichuan earthquake (and posted a list of the schoolchildren who died because of the government¿s ¿tofu-dregs engineering¿), reminisced about Andy Warhol and the East Village art scene, described the irony of being investigated for ¿fraud¿ by the Ministry of Public Security, made a modest proposal for tax collection. Then, on June 1, 2009, Chinese authorities shut down the blog. This book offers a collection of Ai¿s notorious online writings translated into English--the most complete, public documentation of the original Chinese blog available in any language. The New York Times called Ai ¿a figure of Warholian celebrity.¿ He is a leading figure on the international art scene, a regular in museums and biennials, but in China he is a manifold and controversial presence: artist, architect, curator, social critic, justice-seeker. He was a consultant on the design of the famous ¿Bird¿s Nest¿ stadium but called for an Olympic boycott; he received a Chinese Contemporary Art ¿lifetime achievement award¿ in 2008 but was beaten by the police in connection with his ¿citizen investigation¿ of earthquake casualties in 2009. Ai Weiwei's Blog documents Ai¿s passion, his genius, his hubris, his righteous anger, and his vision for China

The first collection of writings by a noted artist and activist whose work has focused on the AIDS epidemic.