Art News

In numbers: Serial publications by artists since 1955 at London’s Institute of Contemporary Arts

LONDON.- In Numbers is a survey exhibition of the often-overlooked genre of serial publications produced by artists around the world from 1955 to the present day at the Institute of Contemporary Arts from 25 January to 18 March 2012. From the rise of the small press in the 1960s and the correspondence art movement of the early 1970s, to the DIY zine culture in the 80s and early 90s, professional artists have always seized on the format of magazines and postcards as a site for a new kind of art production. In large part these are young artists operating at the peripheries of mainstream art cultures, or are established artists looking for an alternative to the marketplace. These are not publications that feature news items, criticism, or reproductions of artworks, but are themselves art works, often collaborative and idiosyncratic. This survey is the first to define a neglected art form that is neither artists’ book nor ephe