In Numbers: Serial Publications by Artists Since 1955

Semina 4, 1959, [Scott Street], San Francisco

The Institute of Contemporary Arts, London, presents, In Numbers: Serial Publications by Artists Since 1955. The show is a survey exhibition of the often-overlooked genre of serial publications produced by artists around the world from 1955 to the present day. From the rise of the small press in the 1960s, to the DIY zine culture in the 1980s and early 1990s, professional artists have always seized on the format of magazines and postcards as a site for a new kind of art production.

In Numbers is the first survey to define a neglected artform that is neither artists’ book nor ephemera, but is entirely its own unique object. The publications are by young artists operating at the peripheries of mainstream art cultures and established artists looking for an alternative to the marketplace. The publications are artworks, often idiosyncratic and produced in collaboration, and they do not feature news items, criticism, or reproductions of artworks.

The exhibition runs at the ICA until March 25th.

In Numbers Catalogue

In Numbers is the first volume to address an overlooked art form that is neither artist's book nor ephemera, but is entirely its own unique entity: the artist's serial publication. Across such groundswell moments as the small press boom of the 1960s, the correspondence art movement of the early 1970s and the DIY zine culture of the 1980s and early 1990s, artists have seized on magazine and postcard formats as forms in themselves. These are not publications that print criticism, manifestos or reproductions of artworks; rather, they are themselves artworks, in large part factured by younger artists operating at the peripheries of mainstream art cultures, or by established artists looking for an alternative to the marketplace. Dating from 1955 to the present, In Numbers begins with Wallace Berman's Semina and continues through Joe Brainard's C Comics, Situationist Times, Eleanor Antin's 100 Boots, File, Robert Heinecken's modified periodicals, the Japanese group Provoke's magazine, Ian Hamilton Finlay's Poor.Old.Tired.Horse, Fluxus, Art-Language, Raymond Pettibon's Tripping Corpse, Maurizio Cattelan's Permanent Food and contemporary examples such as North Drive Press, LTTR and Continuous Project. (Approximately 60 publications in total are surveyed.) Documenting the history of each publication—its inception, production, distribution and impact—together with a fully illustrated bibliography for each title, In Numbers is embellished with essays by Clive Phillpot, Nancy Princenthal, William S. Wilson and Neville Wakefield. An illustrated conversation between Collier Schorr and Gil Blank provides an overview.

The catalogue is a 440 page hardback volume which I highly recommend.
You can get it from The Book Depository UK by going HERE