«CRYSTAL OF RESISTANCE»

AN ARTWORK BY THOMAS HIRSCHHORN FOR THE SWISS PAVILION / VENICE BIENNALE 2011

"Establishing a Critical Corpus"

The book “Establishing a Critical Corpus” is published at the occasion of my work “Crystal of Resistance”at the Swiss pavilion of the Venice Biennial 2011. This "textbook" is a dense, charged and senseful book of texts to think about, different texts, different topics about my work in general, a specific part of my work or about issues that extend beyond my work. These texts constitute the center, the “hardcore” of the book with pictures of my work to "illustrate" each text. "Establishing a Critical Corpus" is a "textbook" with a critical and a sovereign approach to art, to an artwork of today and - in this case - to my artwork is what people are really interested in. This book wants to assert and give form to one of my goals: Establishing a critical corpus with my work.

I invited 6 authors, Claire Bishop, Professor of Art History at CUNY Graduate Center, New York, Sebastian Egenhofer, Professor of Art History at the University of Basel, Hal Foster, Professor of Art History and Archeology at Princeton University, Manuel Joseph, Poet, Paris, Yasmil Raymond, Curator at Dia Art Foundation, New York and Marcus Steinweg, Philosopher, Berlin, to contribute, because – beside friendship – we have established a critical relationship throughout my work. I love what they are doing and I hold in great esteem their work and their integrity as authors.

Thomas Hirschhorn, February 2011