Martha Rosler Library in Liverpool
Martha Rosler Library
Martha Rosler Library, Unitednationsplaza, Berlin, July 2007
A public conversation with Martha Rosler and Stephen Wright.
Martha Rosler Library
April 12 - June 14, 2008
Site
Liverpool John Moores University
School of Art and Design
68 Hope Street
Liverpool L19EB
http://www.ljmu.ac.uk/site
Opening hours: Mon - Sat 11-6 pm
Site is pleased to announce the opening of Martha Rosler Library on Friday, April 11, 2008 at 6pm. Comprised of approximately 7,700 titles from the artist’s personal collection, the Library was opened to the public by Anton Vidokle in November 2005 as a storefront reading room at e-flux, on Ludlow street in New York City. It has since traveled to Frankfurter Kunstverein, MuHKA, Antwerp, unitednationsplaza, Berlin and Institut national d’histoire de l’art, Paris. The library will remain on view in Liverpool through 14 June and will travel to Stills in Edinburgh in the Fall.
“In an act of incredible generosity, one of Americas most important living artists temporarily dispossessed herself of the vast majority of her personal library so that it could be made available for consultation. No borrowing was possible, but the eclectic ensemble of books on economics, political theory, war, colonialism, poetry, feminism, science fiction, art history, mystery novels, childrens books, dictionaries, maps and travel books, as well as photo albums, posters, postcards and newspaper clippings could be studied at will. Smart, decidedly political in orientation, often funny, and all over the place (in that way a perfect mirror of its owner), the library is packed with essential reading and titles that even your better bookstores would love to get their hands on. As the product of decades of avid reading, the contents of the library are both the source of Roslers work and an installation/artwork that continues many of the concerns with public space, access to infor
mation and engaged citizenship that traverse her entire oeuvre.”