Ulrich Obrist

A graphic-novel guide to the demented present from the authors of the bestselling The Age of Earthquakes If you're wondering why the inside of your head feels so strange these days, this book has the answers. The Extreme Self is a new kind of graphic novel that shows how you've been morphing into something else. It's about the remaking of your interior world as the exterior world becomes more unfamiliar and uncertain. Basar, Coupland and Obrist's cult prequel, The Age of Earthquakes: A Guide to the Extreme Present, was hailed as "a meditation on the madness of our media" (Dazed) and "an abstract representation of how we feel about our digital world" (Hello!). Like that book, The Extreme Self collapses comedy and calamity at the speed of swipe. Dazzling images are sourced from over 70 of the world's foremost artists, photographers, technologists and musicians, while Daly & Lyon's kinetic design elevates the language of memes into a manifesto. Over 14 timely chapters, The Extreme Self tours through fame and intimacy, post-work and new crowds, identity crisis and eternity. Crazed, hilarious, unsettling, true. No other book today so presciently predicts how the present and the future have become the same thing. The Extreme Self is an accelerated tale for an even more accelerated culture. Welcome to the Age of You. Cultural critic Shumon Basar (born 1974) is the author of Do You Often Confuse Love with Success and with Fame? (2012). Canadian novelist and artist Douglas Coupland (born 1961) is the author of Girlfriend in a Coma: A Novel (2008), Life After God (1994) and Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture (1991). Swiss art curator, critic and art historian Hans Ulrich Obrist (born 1968) is the artistic director at the Serpentine Galleries in London and the author of numerous books, including Hans Ulrich Obrist: Infinite Conversations (2020), Ways of Curating (2014) and A Brief History of Curating (2008).

Through 140 drawings, thought experiments, recipes, activist instructions, gardening ideas, insurgences and personal revolutions, artists who spend their lives thinking outside the box guide you to a new worldview; where you and the planet are one. Everything here is new. We invite you to rip out pages, to hang them up at home, to draw and scribble, to cook, to meditate, to take the book to your nearest green space. Featuring Olafur Eliasson, Etel Adnan, Alexis Pauline Gumbs, Jane Fonda & Swoon, Judy Chicago, Black Quantum Futurism Collective, Vivienne Westwood, Cauleen Smith, Marina Abramovic, Karrabing Film Collective, and many more.

A highly provocative, mindbending, beautifully designed, and visionary look at the landscape of our rapidly evolving digital era. 50 years after Marshall McLuhan's ground breaking book on the influence of technology on culture in The Medium is the Massage, Basar, Coupland and Obrist extend the analysis to today, touring the world that's redefined by the Internet, decoding and explaining what they call the 'extreme present'. THE AGE OF EARTHQUAKES is a quick-fire paperback, harnessing the images, language and perceptions of our unfurling digital lives. The authors offer five characteristics of the Extreme Present (see below); invent a glossary of new words to describe how we are truly feeling today; and 'mindsource' images and illustrations from over 30 contemporary artists. Wayne Daly's striking graphic design imports the surreal, juxtaposed, mashed mannerisms of screen to page. It's like a culturally prescient, all-knowing email to the reader: possibly the best email they will ever read. Welcome to THE AGE OF EARTHQUAKES, a paper portrait of Now, where the Internet hasn't just changed the structure of our brains these past few years, it's also changing the structure of the planet. This is a new history of the world that fits perfectly in your back pocket. 30+ artists contributions: With contributions from Farah Al Qasimi, Ed Atkins, Alessandro Bavo, Gabriele Basilico, Josh Bitelli, James Bridle, Cao Fei, Alex Mackin Dolan, Thomas Dozol, Constant Dullaart, Cecile B Evans, Rami Farook, Hans-Peter Feldmann, GCC, K-Hole, Liam Gillick, Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster, Eloise Hawser, Camille Henrot, Hu Fang, K-Hole, Koo Jeong-A, Katja Novitskova, Lara Ogel, Trevor Paglen, Yuri Patterson, Jon Rafman, Bunny Rogers, Bogosi Sekhukhuni, Taryn Simon, Hito Steyerl, Michael Stipe, Rosemarie Trockel, Amalia Ulman, David Weir, Trevor Yeung.

Drawing on his own experiences and inspirations - from staging his first exhibition in his tiny Zurich kitchen in 1986 to encounters with artists, exhibition makers and thinkers - Hans Ulrich Obrist looks to inspire all those engaged in the creation of culture. Moving from meetings with artists to the creation of the first public museums in the 18th century, recounting the practice of inspirational figures such as Diaghilev, skipping between exhibitions, continents and centuries, Ways of Curating argues that curation is far from a static practice. Driven by curiosity, at its best it allows us to create the future.

Tato publikace je věnovaná průkopníkům kurátorské činnosti a představuje unikátní sbírku rozhovorů Hanse Ulricha Obrista s Anne d'Harnoncourtovou, Wernerem Hofmannem, Jeanem Leeringem, Franzem Meyerem, Sethem Siegelaubem, Walterem Zaninim, Johannem Claddersem, Lucy Lippardovou, Walterem Hoppsem, Pontem Hulténem a Haraldem Szeemannem. Příspěvky jednotlivých kurátorů popisují vývoj v kurátorské profesi již od počátků nezávislého kurátorství v 60. a 70. letech a experimentální programy v institucích, které se v té době odehrávaly v Evropě i Americe díky Dokumentě a mnoha Bienále. Pro českého čtenáře je kniha zvláště zajímavá bohatostí názorů o významu umění (zejména současného), o novátorském uspořádání instalací a výstav i o roli a budoucnosti galerií a muzeí vůbec. Neobyčejně inspirativní rozhovory lze chápat jako živou alternativní rukověť pro všechny, kteří se zajímají o umění a jeho vystavování.