Is the warmer weather beckoning you to lie out in the sun with a book? Or perhaps you are one of those people who hate the craziness of Christmas and shop early?
Artshub takes a look at recent new art publications released.
On the list:
1. The Theatre of War
In a special edition of 50 copies, which includes a genuine offset proof sheet from the book-printing process signed and numbered by the artist, The Theatre of War is a stunning visual translation of Stanislava Pinchuk’s major three-channel moving image work of the same title. It is her first book with Perimeter Editions and recasts the opening lines of Homer’s epic poem The Iliad, which is set nine years into the Trojan War. Similarly, the video is set in the future, nine years into Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The Theatre of War features an interview between the artist and Ukrainian curator and art historian Lilia Kudelia.
Publisher: Perimeter Editions (Melbourne).
Format: 168 pages, section-sewn softcover with fold-out dust jacket.
ISBN: 978-1-922545-34-3
Price: $50 and $250 (special edition of 50 copies)
Released: September 2024
2. Nolan’s Africa
Nolan’s Africa looks at the artist in a way that he has never been looked at before. Andrew Turley takes readers on a journey from the United Nations Headquarters in New York to a suspected assassination on the Congo border, from the crematoria of Auschwitz to the formation of the World Wildlife Fund and on to the plains of the Serengeti. He walks in Nolan’s footsteps across Tanzania, Uganda and Ethiopia, seeing the world through the artist’s eyes. Written over 12 years and across three continents, this is the first book based on the newly opened Sidney Nolan Archives at the National Library of Australia, containing never-before-seen diaries, photographs and personal notes.
The monograph, written by Nolan authority Turley, encourages readers to consider the effect of the Holocaust, animal extinctions, colonial disenfranchisement and human conflict on the artist and society.
Publisher: The Miegunyah Press (Melbourne University Publishing)
Author: Andrew Turley
ISBN: 9780522880250
Price: $120
Released: 19 November 2024
3. James Fairfax: Portrait of a Collector in Eleven Objects
Delve into the collection of one of the nation’s greatest philanthropists, collectors and champions of Australian art in James Fairfax: Portrait of a Collector in Eleven Objects by his nephew, Alexander Edward Gilly. He pieces together Fairfax’s life through the prism of his art collection, revealing the complex private and public lives of a man at the centre of a media dynasty.
“A beautifully written biography, dramatic, sensitive and full of heart. Gilly illuminates not only the life of one of Australia’s most interesting figures but an entire era.”– Sebastian Smee.
Publisher: NewSouth Books (UNSW Press)
Author: Alexander Edward Gilly
Format: Hardback
ISBN: 9781761170249
Price: $49.99
Released: December 2024
Read: Are art books an anomaly in the publishing industry?
4. Double Happiness
ArtsHub sister site ScreenHub’s own Rochelle Siemienowicz releases her latest book this month, Double Happiness – a story about sex, honesty and jealousy – and the challenges of forging a new kind of romance. Set in Melbourne, and told from three perspectives over a seven-year period, this lyrical contemporary love story explores the complexities of non-monogamy with humour and heart.
Publisher: MidnightSun Publishing
Format: Paperback
ISBN: 9781922858474
Price: $34.99
Released: 1 October 2024
5. Melbourne Ghost Signs
This November, cultural archaeologist Sean Reynolds is releasing his first book, Melbourne Ghost Signs – a beguiling photographic collection of the faded signs and half-hidden logos of Melbourne, revealing the historic tales of this ever-changing city. American-born Reynolds first became fascinated by these old signs while walking in Yarraville and Footscray with his young daughter during their daily lockdown outings.
Publisher: Scribe
Format: 176 pages, Hardback
ISBN: 9781761380815
Price: $59.99
Released: 29 October 2024 (pre-order available)
6. Paris in Ruins: Love, War and the Birth of Impressionism
Sebastian Smee’s Paris in Ruins is a book of great narrative sweep and vivid detail, according to his publisher. ‘Impressionism was a complex reaction to an age of violence and war. From the summer of 1870 to the spring of 1871, the ‘Terrible Year’, Paris and its people were cut off, starved and forced to surrender by Germans,’ says Text. Smee tells this story through the eyes of these key artists, with a special focus on the intimate, enigmatic relationship between Manet and Morisot, the group’s only female member in its early years.
“Astonishing. Heartstopping. A true story confined by two brutal years, and the walls of a great city under siege, which exults in love, courage, beauty, mischief and the mystery of human intimacy.” – Annabel Crabb
Publisher: Text Publishing
Format: 368pp, Paperback
ISBN: 97819230580
Price: $36.99
Released: 10 September 2024
Read: 5 tips to launch your book
7. Glot: Four Conversations on Voice
Accompanying the exhibition Glot at the CCS Bard Hessel Museum, Bard College (April to May 2024), this reader features original interviews with the exhibition’s participating artists: Shahrzad Changalvaee, JJJJJerome Ellis, Nour Mobarak and Anri Sala. Glot, titled after the Greek-origin suffix meaning ‘to have a tongue’, is a project about speech and its limits. In these long-form interviews with curator and editor Sophie Rose, the four artists reflect on the elements of vocal expression in their works that exceed linguistic construction. Through these discussions, Changalvaee, Ellis, Mobarak and Sala suggest a politics of speech beyond clear articulation: a politics residing in the material of voice itself, which both carries and disturbs the speaker’s intention. You can buy it from the Institute of Modern Art (IMA), Brisbane, which recently hosted its Australian book launch.
Publisher: CCS Bard NY
Editor: Sophie Rose
Format: 64 pages, Softcover
ISBN: 9798989899203
Price: $10
Released: Late August 2024
8. Paddy Bedford: Gouache
This newly published book, is dedicated to the gouache practice of celebrated Gija artist, Paddy Bedford, and accompanies an exhibition of his gouaches presented by D’Lan Contemporary (Melbourne and New York). Many of these works have never been exhibited, and the book documents over 80 works on paper alongside written contributions from those who knew Bedford and his practice intimately – including friend and executor Frances Kofod, and curator Georges Petitjean – with an overview from D’Lan Contemporary’s Head of Research, Vanessa Merlino. Paddy Bedford: Gouache is the first major monograph on the artist since his retrospective exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, Sydney, in 2006.
Publisher: D’Lan Contemporary
Editor: Vanessa Merlino
Format: 104 pages, Hardcover
ISBN: 978-1-7635565-1-5
Price: $59.95
Released: August 2024
9. marramarra: Indigenous artists making history visible (Pre-orders)
marramarra (a Wiradjuri word meaning to create, make or do) is a beautiful illustrated art book that explores how contemporary Indigenous artists and their communities are revealing hidden histories and finding pathways to healing. Led by Indigenous voices and presenting ground-breaking artworks from the Pacific, Turtle Island (North and Central America), Brazil, Finland, Taiwan, Afghanistan and beyond, marramarra: Indigenous artists making history visible provides new ways to think about the past and imagine a planet that is bright for Indigenous futures.
Publisher: NewSouth Books (UNSW Press)
Authors: Drs Brook Garru Andrew and Jessica Neath
Format: 256 pages, Paperback
ISBN: 9781742237039
Price: $49.99
Released: 1 November2024
10. Imagining a Real Australia
Documentary photography offers one way of looking, but this type of looking is also about feeling. It is a style of making photographs designed to draw people into the world and activate their interest in something beyond themselves. It is a thought embraced by author Stephen Zagala, who offers a stunning testament to a time when photographers turned their lenses on real people living real lives in his new book, Imagining a Real Australia.
Australian documentary photography was at its height from the 1950s to 1970s. A time of great flux – social, political and cultural – was reflected in the photographs of Max Dupain, Carol Jerrems, William Yang, Rennie Ellis, David Moore, Mervyn Bishop, Sue Ford and others. Zagala maps out that period in this book.
Publisher: NewSouth Books (UNSW Press)
Format: 208 pages, Paperback
ISBN: 9781742236926
Price: $59.99
Released: December 2024
11. Sarah Contos: Eye Lash Horizon
This publication accompanies Sarah Contos’ first major institutional exhibition, which maps the concepts, media and preoccupations that have shaped her artistic practice for over two decades. The 300-page monograph includes texts by Sarah Contos, Karen Hall, Natalya Lusty, Daniel Mudie Cunningham and Naomi Riddle, and is co-published with Art Ink.
Publisher: UNSW Galleries and Art Ink
Format: 304 pages (Edition of 650)
ISBN: 978-0-6450166-2
Price: Publication $70 or with tote $100
Released: November (pre-order available).
12. Abramović-isms
No stranger to Australian audiences, Marina Abramović is arguably the most important and influential performance artist of our time. Gathered from interviews, lectures, writings and other sources, Abramović-isms is a unique collection of quotations that offers a window into the mind of this iconic trailblazer. A fun read over summer, or a great stocking stuffer.
Editor Larry Warsh has been active in the art world for more than 30 years as a publisher and artist-collaborator. He is the editor of many books, including The Notebooks of Jean-Michel Basquiat, Judy Chicago-isms, Warhol-isms and Weiwei-isms (all Princeton).
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Editor: Larry Warsh
Format: 176 pages / Hardback
ISBN: 9780691263731
Price: $29.99
Released: 22 October
And in case you missed it:
