La galerie erna hécey est heureuse de présenter la collection complète des livres d’artistes édités par onestar press dans un mobilier conçu par Hans Schabus et le nouveau poster de John Armleder.
Et les multiples de John Armleder, Pierre Bismuth, Kendell Geers, Beat Streuli.
galerie erna hécey rue des fabriques 1c fabrieksstraat bruxelles 1000 t. +32.2 502 00 24 www.ernahecey.com
For onestar stop, Austrian artist Hans Schabus has designed something like a bus or a train stop, made out of cheap plywood, easy to assemble and disassemble, 3 meters long, in five sections (each section holds the books from one of onestar press’s years in existence). The books are shelved behind the seats, and a « stop sign » with one red star rises from the top. The module can be extended for future onestar press publications. To complement this original design, the onestar stop is presented alongside a specially commissioned 4 x 3 metre poster by Christophe Boutin, with a text by Jan Avgikos, the American based art critic. The Installation is a stunning way to present the onestar press’ « encyclopedic » production of books by artists. The readers / viewers can enjoy the books while waiting for the mythical onestar bus to take them to their point of destination.
Hans Schabus’ onestar stop is limited to an edition of 8, plus 2 artists’ proofs. This installation of onestar stop at Art Metropole was built and constructed in Toronto by Canadian artist Melanie Zanker of Mazzie Design and Associates (http://www.mazzie.ca). The onestar stop is available for purchase through Art Metropole. onestar books on display in the onestar stop will be also available individually by special order through Art Metropole.
Tune In. Turn On… To onestar press Plenty of people feel that the art world has become a veritable machine driven by the interests of big money, shallow collectors, unscrupulous dealers, and assorted power mongers who evince little regard for anything less than flavor-of-the-month “trophy art.” The young artist, whose career arcs in a year or two, is beset with pressure to succeed immediately or not at all. Paradoxically, as artists mature beyond their 20s and 30s and get much better at what they do, their chances of success diminish exponentially. The best antidote to tough times is brewed from entrepreneurial spirit and collaborative energy, compounded by inventive means of distribution. This palliative aids in the creation of dynamic formations with new centers of gravity that tease out lethargy and renew our determination not only to make the world our own, but to have a good time doing it, too. onestar press keeps coming on strong. Find the future here. Jan Avgikos, 2006
New onestar press Publication Coinciding with the exhibition, and in collaboration with Art Metropole, onestar press is publishing a new artists’ book, Smurfistan, by Canadian artist Jamelie Hassan. The bookwork presents fragments from her recent Smurfistan installations of the spatial realm of the room of a young child. The smurfs, created by Peyo, were very popular among children in the 1980’s. In this calamity of children’s toys - Smurfs preside and soldiers, cowboys, dragons, dinosaurs dispute with each other. Hassan focuses on the world of a child, learning situations and the rupture of socio-cultural norms. The bookwork also contains a companion text, « Children & Social Spaces : Why Did Derrida Say No » by Ottawa-based fiction writer Marwan Hassan.
Jamelie Hassan was born in London, Ontario and continues to make this her home. Her works are part of numerous collections, such as the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto and the New Museum of Contemporary Art in New York. In 2001 she received the Governor General’s Award in recognition of 30 years of contribution to visual arts in Canada.
Discover the entire collection of onestar press books by artists in a specially designed piece of furniture by Hans Schabus : the “onestar stop”. Along with Hans Schabus’ new work, Mélanie Scarciglia’s movie, “Making the book” (2005), will be projected. Christophe Boutin is designing a 4 x 3m poster. More than 130 artists have contributed to onestar press’s collection of books by artists : Lawrence Weiner, John Armleder, Beat Streuli, Josh Smith, Mai Ueda, Erwin Wurm, Hans Schabus and many others.
“Take a load off your feet !” Hans Schabus (his work has been being exhibited in the Austrian pavilion at the 2005 Venice Biennal) has recently designed the ultimate utopian pit stop for the body and the mind : useful, practical, modern, and inexpensive to build. His “onestar stop” is something like a bus or a train stop, made out of cheap plywood, 3 meters long, in five sections (each section holds the books from one of onestar press’s years in existence), easy to assemble and disassemble. The books are shelved behind the seats, which may be upholstered in red carpet. The “onestar stop” can be expanded to accommodate future publications. The star in the stop sign is red of course. Hans’s design is perfect for museums, galleries, and art fairs, although it’s not hard to imagine it in more traditional public spaces as well. As a long-term collaborator at onestar press, several of Hans’s books would be on the “onestar- stop” shelf, along with over a hundred other artists. With such a choice, the random passerby who chooses to sit down and browse may never get to his/her destination. Richard Dailey, 2005
Every month or so, a new publication emerges from the Paris-based onestar press, which has released more than seventhy artist’s books, multiples, and films since its inception in 2000. Perhaps it helps to know that onestar’s founder former punk rocker Christophe Boutin, launched the press with his own hilarious (trust me) Self-Defense, in which he beats himself, in effigy, with a baseball bat. Though Boutin has largely turned his attention to filmmaking, he continues to run onestar in collaboration with Mélanie Scarciglia an Sébastien de Ganay. Onestar’s punishing pace depends on simple production (mainly of inexpensive paperbacks), on small print runs, and above all on forswearing editorial oversight. Everything published, their website proudly announces, is « strictly un-edited by the publisher ». The spirit, in other words, is age-of-internet for readers who can’t let go of the printed page ; acquisitions (if that’s not too aggressive a word) depend largely on a daisy chain of artist’s referrals. Abdicating editorial control can lead to some dubious decisions, but the bulk of the work is fresh, smart, spry, and wildly various. Among the latest offerings are a monograph on Michael Rakowitz’s para-architectural projects ; an African Bété alphabet book by Frédéric Bruly Bouabré ; a scrapbook by Jonas Mekas ; a compendium of the dearest current wishes of 231 artists, collected under the title « Je Veux » ; and Mary Ellen Carroll’s brilliantly anarchic identity scramblers, « All the Men Who Think They Can Be Me ». onestar’s new venture include a free quarterly online magazine (available on paper as well) called Afterart News (« the truth is,’art’ as we know it is dead », an editorial claims, hence the post-hoc title). Surprisingly cheerful for a eulogy, Afterart consists mostly of short notices for onestar publications, which makes th reprieve of its promise to dispense with editorial oversight a little disingenuous. Still, just keeping up with what onestar is doing is not the least effective way of checking out what’s brewing in some very interesting artist’s minds.
Nancy Princenthal is a New York-based critic and a regular contributor to Art in America.
