Gagosian celebrates the genius of Chris Burden with the publication of Poetic Practical

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I am constantly searching for the edge.—Chris Burden

 NEW YORK, March 1, 2022—Gagosian is pleased to announce the publication of Poetic Practical: The Unrealized Work of Chris Burden, a revelatory book more than five years in the making. Poetic Practical presents sixty-seven projects of varying scope and ambition that #chrisburden (1946–2015) was unable to complete during his lifetime. Offering a unique perspective on the work of this formidable artist—the very first to be represented by Larry Gagosian beginning in 1978 and continuing for nearly forty years—the projects are divided into sections devoted to energy, systems, architecture, and power, and to Xanadu, a monumental unrealized installation of a cityscape. The book's organizational structure illuminates recurring themes and relationships among seemingly unrelated artworks. An epilogue explores the contents of Burden's last notebook, while "Anatomy of the Artist," an essay by critic and scholar Donatien Grau, recounts the unrealized projects' wider history. The publication also features a foreword by Yayoi Shionoiri, executive director of the #chrisburden Estate, and an introduction by Burden scholar Sydney Stutterheim. Poetic Practical: The Unrealized Work of Chris Burden will be available for purchase in Gagosian's physical and online shops at a price of $120 and also distributed by Rizzoli International Publications.A radical and uncompromising figure with a fierce social consciousness, Burden consistently challenged limitations, from his action-based works of the 1970s that focused on his own body to the technical feats of his later sculptures that intervened in spaces. In doing so, he reflected on the surreal and precarious realities of contemporary life and invited the viewer to join in these contemplations.In her text, Stutterheim considers the unique perspective that the projects discussed in Poetic Practical offer on the life and practice of a truly remarkable artist. Writing about the 2015 visit by Grau to Burden's studio that sparked the initial idea for the book, she describes the special opportunity that the contextualization of these rarely seen materials affords readers to revisit and understand the thematic and practical interconnections that run through Burden's thought and methodology. "Despite the vast range of aesthetic concerns, methods, mediums, and practices that comprise Burden's artistic output," she observes, "the evaluation of limits and boundaries remained a core element throughout his career, evident in both his realized and his unrealized works. Burden repeatedly put pressure on established parameters, whether in social, political, ontological, physical, or conceptual terms.""The #chrisburden Estate is honored to see this publication realized," commented Yayoi Shionoiri, executive director of the Estate. "We hope that it will serve as a resource for years to come about Burden's work, including the diverse nature of his practice, and his interests and concerns."Gagosian's extensive in-house publishing program has produced nearly six hundred books, including catalogues raisonnés, artist monographs, scholarly exhibition catalogues, and limited-edition artist's books. The gallery started publishing in 1986 and today its output rivals that of traditional arts trade publishers, averaging between twenty-five and forty books a year. Recent subjects include Georg Baselitz, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Helen Frankenthaler, Katharina Grosse, Damien Hirst, Donald Judd, Nam June Paik, Gerhard Richter, Ed Ruscha, Jenny Saville, Mary Weatherford, and Rachel Whiteread. The gallery also produces Gagosian Quarterly, a celebrated print and online magazine, which will launch its fifth anniversary issue this month.

Chris Burden was born in Boston in 1946, and died in Topanga, California, in 2015. Collections include the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; and Tate, London. Solo museum exhibitions include A Twenty-Year Survey, Orange County Museum of Art, Newport Beach, CA (1988, traveled to Carnegie Mellon University Art Gallery, Pittsburgh; and Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, through 1989); When Robots Rule: The Two-Minute Airplane Factory, Tate Britain, London (1999); Tower of Power, Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien, Vienna (2002); 14 Magnolia Double Lamps, South London Gallery (2006); Middelheim Museum, Antwerp, Belgium (2009); Three Ghost Ships, Portland Art Museum, OR (2011–12); Magasin III, Stockholm (2012–13); Extreme Measures, New Museum, New York (2013–14); The Master Builder, Rose Art Museum, Brandeis University, Waltham, MA (2014); and Ode to Santos Dumont, Los Angeles County Museum of Art (2015).

About the Book
Foreword by Yayoi Shionoiri, texts by Sydney Stutterheim and Andie Trainer, essay by Donatien Grau
Published by Gagosian
Format: Hardcover
Size: 9 × 12 inches (22.9 × 30.5 cm)
Pages: 284 pages
ISBN: 978-0-8478-7191-9
Price: $120 USD