Saturday, May 16, 2026 - Sunday, May 17, 2026

Artist-Bookseller (16 & 17 May 2026), 41 Bleecker Street (please do not ring any of the apartment units). Open 11 AM-5 PM, appointments appreciated (phone: 646.420.4652 / email: yoshi@jonathanAhill.com)

 

This exhibition is a modest survey of artists who engage in the trade of bookselling as part of their practice. The operation of a bookstore was envisioned as a way to wrest control over modes of distribution and dissemination of artists’ publications and information about contemporary art by General Idea (Art Metropole, Toronto) Ulises Carrión and Aart van Barneveld (Other Books and So, Amsterdam), and the founders of Printed Matter, Inc. (New York). Directly inspired by Carrión, two artist-run bookshops arose in the 1980’s, El Archivero in Mexico City and Boekie Woekie in Amsterdam. We then trace this international lineage of artist-booksellers through Jean-Noël Herlin (New York) and Steven Leiber (San Francisco) who cultivated a market and appreciation for art documentation (i.e., “extra art”). The final part of our exhibition focuses on Ben Kinmont’s conception of Ben Kinmont, Bookseller as an artwork in its own right “out of a need to survive and as an experiment on how to operate as an artist independent of the commercial gallery system."

These valuable bibliographic and artistic contributions are documented in the form of bookseller catalogues, ephemera, posters and flyers, etc. Pieces by the following artists/firms will also be shown: Ecart (Geneva), workfortheeyetodo (London), Arnaud Desjardin (London), Ricardo Valentim (San Diego), Naranja (Santiago, Chile), Bungee Space (New York), and Ulises (Philadelphia).