THE ANTI-LIBRARY
JULY 26 - ONGOING
Lucie Fontaine is pleased to present “The Anti-Library,” an on-going project, which takes place in her Milan space and starts on July 26.
In November 2011, the library of SPACE – an established institution which has been an active player in the U.K.’s contemporary art scene since the 60s in Hackney, London – first housed “The Anti-Library,” a project focused on unread books and on theories related to the meaning of anti- or non-knowledge in the fields of knowing, learning and the intellectual experience. From this very point of view, Nassim Taleb’s abstract from his famous book The Black Swan – dealing with the concept of ‘Anti-Library’ in connection to Umberto Eco’s library – is a fundamental landmark.
According to the author, Eco’s huge library includes a large amount of unread books – and these are to play the most important role in valuing the cultural prominence of their owner. In fact, the progressive accumulation, over the years, of an increasing amount of unread books, means a kind of intellective growth, which remains open. The more you know the larger is the amount of unread books you own. The already read ones, on the contrary, seem to fix a knowledge, which is concluded in itself and therefore is somehow sterile.
Following these premises, SPACE invited more than 150 among artists, curators, journalists, writers and people belonging to the field of culture, to indicate a book they hadn’t read and also to write a short statement to illustrate their choice. All of the volumes have been gathered in a special environment designed by Fay Nicolson and Oliver Smith.
In collaboration with Paul Pieroni, curator of SPACE, “The Anti-Library” will be recreated at Lucie Fontaine’s space in Milan, adding contributions from Italian curators and artists. More precisely, a permanent archive will be put together, containing the collection of the volumes together with their statements – which will be added to the ones previously selected in London.
At the same time, the contributors will be part of a series of talks and conversations organized by Lucie Fontaine. If you wish to receive more information about the series please subscribe to Lucie Fontaine’s newsletter or email Lucie Fontaine employee’s at heloise.luciefontaine@gmail.com and licorne.luciefontaine@gmail.com