Magiciens de la Terre

First Edition, 1989. 272 pages. Book measures 11.25 x 14.25 inches. Black cloth. Text in French. Illustrated throughout in color and black and white.

Catalogue for the major international exhibition held at the Centre Georges Pompidou in 1989. In 1989, in the wake of the “Primitivism” show at MOMA, curator Jean-Hubert Martin set out to create a show that counteracted ethnocentric practices within the contemporary art world as a replacement for the format of the traditional Paris Biennial. This exhibition sought to correct the problem of ”one hundred percent of exhibitions ignoring eighty percent of the earth.” Martin organized an international exhibition of contemporary art that featured 50% Western and 50% non-Western artists shoulder to shoulder in an equal manner where all participants were still alive at the time of exhibiting, making it truly contemporary. Magiciens also marked a departure from previous exhibitions of non-Western work by identifying non-Western artists by their proper names alongside their Western counterparts, who were always identified in this manner. The artists were presented as individuals rather than by geographic region or time period as was commonplace. This was an attempt by Martin and his curatorial team to subvert the illusion of Eurocentric superiority in the field of artistic representation and the vision of the world inherited from the colonial age. Magiciens de la Terre literally translates to “Magicians of the Earth.”

This large format, beautifully designed monograph contains works from some of the 100 exhibiting artists including Marina Abramovic, Dossou Amidou, John Baldessari, Alighiero Boetti, Louise Bourgeois, Francesco Clemente, Bowa Devi, Dexing Gu, Hans Haacke, Shirazeh Houshiary, Anselm Kiefer, Agbagli Kossi, Tatso Miyajima, Claes Oldenburg, Nam June Paik, Yousuf Thannoun, Lawrence Wiener, and many others. With essays by Martin, Aline Luque, Mark Francis, Andre Magnin, Pierre Gaudibert, Thomas McEvilley, Homi Bhabha, Jacques Soulillou, and Bernard Marcadé. 

Very Good in solid binding. Dust jacket has one small tape repair to small tear at inside  top spine, and shows light wear to edges. Jacket is bright, showing no fading to spine. Very Good in Very Good dust jacket.