Jannis Kounellis

Description

Greek-born Jannis Kounellis was one of the key artists in the Arte Povera movement, and this book puts his career into context as never before. Following his breakthrough in the late 1960s in Rome, when he questioned the traditionally sterile environment of the gallery by exhibiting live animals within its walls, Kounellis went on to include diverse materials in his work, including fire, earth, gold, wood, and charcoal, quickly establishing himself as one of the most innovative sculptors of our time.

Philip Larratt-Smith is an independent curator and writer based in New York. Rudi Fuchs is an art historian and former director of the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam.

"Kounellis was a true realist - not because he endeavored to represent reality faithfully through figuration, but on account of his deep and lasting commitment to the meaningfulness of embodied social and material experience."-Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev, Artforum "Each time you see Kounellis's work, you are reminded of all that went before: plain things, universal, ancient, and yet unarguably modern."-Laura Cumming, Observer