JOSEPHINE MECKSEPER — The Josephine Meckseper Catalogue No. 2, Sternberg Press, New York and Berlin, 2006

The second of Meckseper’s artist-designed catalogues, bringing together installations, photographs and display works from the period surrounding her participation in the 2006 Whitney Biennial. Text by Sylvère Lotringer.

Meckseper adopts the visual structures of the boutique, department store and commercial catalogue to place political imagery beside luxury goods, reflective shelving and consumer objects. Demonstration and display are treated as parallel systems: both organise bodies, symbols and commodities for public circulation.

The cover compresses that relationship into a single image. A hammer and sickle are photographed as polished merchandise against a reflective surface, while the reverse reproduces shattered glass. Revolution, damage and commercial design are retained within the finish of a carefully manufactured publication.

Produced during the Iraq War and the continued absorption of protest imagery into fashion and advertising, the catalogue does more than document Meckseper’s installations. It repeats their method. Political symbol, artwork and consumer object are isolated, sequenced and returned as merchandise.

This copy remains unopened in its original Sternberg Press shrink-wrap, preserving the publication in the form in which it first entered circulation.

24 × 24 cm. 48 pages. Softcover, unopened in the original publisher’s shrink-wrap; colour illustrations; text in English. Condition: unopened in the original publisher-issued shrink-wrap. The wrap shows rubbing, scratches, handling marks and minor pulling and creasing at the corners and edges. The book beneath remains sealed and has not been examined internally.

Securely packed; tracked UK and international shipping available.