Books from the wilderness

121+ Bookshop, Corraini Edizioni, from 23rd January to 3rd February 2018, Milan.

The installation Books from the Wilderness has turned into a desert inhabited by ruins from modernist architecture the interior of the Milanese bookshop 121+. The content and the container tell a unique story, the first installment of a series organized by the publisher Corraini Editions. The volumes cover a wide range of tastes, for instance, the anarchist Colin Ward, the artist Bruno Munari, the Japanese manga Fist of the North Star, and the Bible. Combined with shapes made of sponge and yellow lights, the 60 books printed by different publishing houses tell the tale of a long biblical voyage through the desert, a story of decadence and rebirth. The project is an interpretation of the desert as a place of purification. It’s a habitat where the bequests of modernity become free elements devoid of their reciprocal relations. These loose elements allow us to imagine new formulations and realities. One symbol of modernity is given by a scale reproduction of Villa Savoye, a house built by Le Corbusier outside Paris in 1929. Here, it is built from blocks of sponge meant to be taken apart and put back together in different ways by the public, according to circumstances or inclination.

 

Curated by Corraini Editions and 121+ with the technical support of Martini SPA
Ph. Davide Galli