Rebecca Horn [Hardcover]

Germano Celant (Author), Nancy Spector (Author), Giuliana Bruno (Author), Katharina Schmidt (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1994

Explores the fascinating and tantalizing work that has won Horn two decades of critical attention in Europe and America. This book contains four essays and numerous photographs of her work, including early performance pieces, mechanomorphic sculptures, site-specific installations and films.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

A performance artist, filmmaker, sculptor and poet, Horn explores the themes of human vulnerability and emotional fragility in her disquieting, often beguiling happenings, movies, anthropomorphized machines and fetishistic objects. Wearing fan-like wings, masks, long pull-on fingers or torso-enveloping feathers, her performers probe the possibilities of human flesh and the imagination. One site-specific installation, Concert in Reverse --set in a medieval German tower that was used by the Nazis to torture and execute Russian and Polish prisoners--sought to counteract the erasure of history. Horn's film, La Ferdinanda , set in a Medici villa owned by nouveau-riche industrialists, is a study of counterfeit existences. In this catalogue of an exhibit at the Guggenheim Museum in Manhattan, Celant, a Guggenheim curator, and a team of scholars unravel the multiple meanings and mythic symbols in this German artist's restlessly experimental work.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

This is essentially a catalog of the exhibition of Horn's work held at the Guggenheim Museum in New York City's Soho last summer. There are two interviews with Horn, a German artist whose work has been rightly described as simultaneously disturbing and fascinating. Four well-written essays treat various aspects of her work, examining meaning and content as well as installations. Topics like "The Divine Comedy of Rebecca Horn," "Hybrid Machines," "A Different World," and her interiors are discussed in some detail. Sections on performances and films, a filmography, and a biography complete the text; an index would have been helpful. The illustrations provide a sense of Horn's work, although there is a lack of clarity in many, and, on the whole, the quality of the reproductions is not as good as one might have expected. Still, this is an excellent synopsis of Horn's work and career. Recommended for larger art collections.
- Martin Chasin, Adult Inst., Bridgeport, Ct.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 344 pages
• Publisher: Guggenheim Museum Pubns; 2 edition (November 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0810968703
• ISBN-13: 978-0810968707
• Product Dimensions: 12.2 x 9.5 x 1.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,380,269 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3.0 out of 5 stars Wanting more, January 21, 2008

By 

R. Hunt - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Rebecca Horn: Drawings, Sculptures, Installations 1964-2006 (Hardcover)

I agree with the previous review. This book is missing some of the critical works and powerful discussions generated by Rebecca Horn, the book is incomplete.

4.0 out of 5 stars Strong Artist, not comprehensive book., February 1, 2007

By 

C. HOUGHTON "contemporary artist" (Brooklyn, NY USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Rebecca Horn: Drawings, Sculptures, Installations 1964-2006 (Hardcover)

I was hoping for a more thorough compendium of this powerful artist's work. This book is good, but it's missing some important pieces in Horn's portfolio. Still her work is profound and makes me want to see it all, in person. The art is installation, drawings and performances of a very experiential nature, somewhat akin to Bruce Nauman.