Research Catalog

Title

A handful of dust : from the cosmic to the domestic / David Campany.

Author

Campany, David

Publication

[London] : Mack ; [Paris] : Le Bal, [2015]

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Additional Authors

Bal (Art organization : Paris, France), host institution.

Description

153, 72 pages : illustrations (some color); 24 cm

Summary

A Handful of Dust is David Campany's speculative history of the last century, and a visual journey through some of its unlikeliest imagery. Let's suppose the modern era begins in October of 1922. A little French avant-garde journal publishes a photograph of a sheet of glass covered in dust. The photographer is Man Ray, the glass is by Marcel Duchamp. At first they called it a view from an aeroplane. Then they called it 'Dust Breeding'. It's abstract, it's realist. It's an artwork, it's a document. It's revolting and compelling. Cameras must be kept away from dust but they find it highly photogenic. At the same time, a little English journal publishes T.S. Eliot's poem 'The Waste Land'. "I will show you fear in a handful of dust." And what if dust is really the key to the intervening years? Why do we dislike it? Is it cosmic? We are stardust, after all. Is it domestic? Inevitable and unruly, dust is the enemy of the modern order, its repressed other, its nemesis. But it has a story to tell from the other side. Campany's connections range far and wide, from aerial reconnaisance and the American dustbowl to Mussolini's final car journey and the wars in Iraq. 'A Handful of Dust' will accompany Campany's exhibition of the same name, curated for Le Bal, Paris (opening September 2015), with works by Man Ray, John Divola, Sophie Ristelhueber, Mona Kuhn, Gerhard Richter, Xavier Ribas, Nick Waplington, Jeff Wall and many others, alongside anonymous press photos, postcards, magazine spreads and movies. Exhibition: Le Bal, Paris, France (opening September 2015).

Subject

• Man Ray, 1890-1976
• Duchamp, Marcel, 1887-1968
• Photography, Artistic > 20th century > Exhibitions
• Photography, Abstract > 20th century > Exhibitions
• Landscape photography > 20th century > Exhibitions
• Dust in art
• Dust in literature

Note

• The second sequence of pages comprises a book within a book at the center of the volume.

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references.

Call Number

MFW 16-211

ISBN

• 9781910164389
• 1910164380

LCCN

2015513714

OCLC

913853191

Author

Campany, David, author.

Title

A handful of dust : from the cosmic to the domestic / David Campany.

Publisher

[London] : Mack ; [Paris] : Le Bal, [2015]

Edition

First edition published by Mack.

Type of Content

text

still image

Type of Medium

unmediated

Type of Carrier

volume

Bibliography

Includes bibliographical references.

Added Author

Bal (Art organization : Paris, France), host institution.

Research Call Number

MFW 16-211