Published by DESTE Foundation for Contemporary Art. Edited by Karen Marta, Massimiliano Gioni. Text by Anne Pontégnie.
Through painting, collage, artist books, sculpture and ceramics, Josh Smith's work is dominated by spontaneous, gestural brushstrokes and vibrant colors and characterized by systematic processes, replication, and serial repetition. Using his signature to structure the space of the picture, Smith investigates notions of authorship, authenticity and originality. Part of the 2000 Words series, conceived and commissioned by Massimiliano Gioni, and published by the Deste Foundation, 2000 Words: Josh Smith presents the entirety of the American artist's works in the Dakis Joannou Collection and includes an essay by Anne Pontegnie that examines how the artist explicitly seeks to open up a different pictorial space.
New York painter Josh Smith first became known for using his name as a motif in his work--an ironic act of self-marketing. Later series further demonstrated his ability to collage manual input and mechanical reproduction, challenging myths of creation. In this artist's book, Smith highlights the process of art reproduction.
Published by Walther König, Köln. Text by Achim Hochdörfer.
Published to accompany Josh Smith's one-person exhibition at Vienna's Museum of Modern Art, this volume contains scores of recent works alongside a very generous selection of texts. Smith is described by Achim Hochdörfer as “Very similar to Kippenberger, but more American, more working class and more jaded probably--less hopeful."
Published by Holzwarth Publications. Interview by Sophie Aschauer.
Josh Smith's work focuses on themes of authenticity and authorship. He first became known for paintings in which he used his name as a motif on the canvas, shattering the myth of the artist through an act of ironic self-marketing. In his latest series, Abstraction, Smith creates archetypes from abstract paintings--airy compositions in lively colors. Although he takes his stylistic cue from the Abstract Expressionist school, which bestowed mythical status upon the artist, Smith's unusual color combinations and cartoon-like forms retain little of this weighty background. His appropriations from abstract painting are quite direct, and endow this artistic tradition with a refreshing lack of pretension. The first volume of this slipcased set features Smith's abstract paintings; the second features his palette paintings--palettes on which the artist has squeezed out his brushes, pursuing a completely straightforward aesthetic of simple forms. A text booklet contains an interview with the artist.
Published by Walther König/mfc-michle didier, Brussels.
This book is the result of a collaboration between the artists Christopher Wool and Josh Smith. Their method is reminiscent of musical improvisation: to start, one of them proposes an image from his own body of work. From this basic picture, the other generates another image by reworking it through digital programs like Photoshop. Thus, new images made with “four hands” are created. The book is simply designed, with no texts, just black-and-white abstraction after abstraction. Here, the reproduction of the art image is just as important as the work of art. In other words, one can see pixels, blurred brushstrokes, the glare of a flashbulb reflecting off oil paint or a smudged Xerox effect. It’s all part of the work--rather than highlighting the process of painting, the artists are highlighting the process of reproduction itself.
Josh Smith
Josh Smith: Hidden Darts Reader
Josh Smith: Abstraction
Josh Smith & Christopher Wool: Can Your Monkey do the Dog