Artist Ryan Gander and critic Jonathan P Watts have spent the last year and a half delving into 281 of the most interesting creative minds of our time. They've gathered their findings into book form (or, more accurately, USB-book form), that you can buy for £5, by ‘downloading’ it from a pop-up vending machine in London's Cork Street Galleries.
‘We asked a cohort of internationally creative people to imagine they’ve missed the last train home,’ Gander and Watts write in the introduction. They asked: ‘Is there one piece of writing that you would want with you for company in the small hours?’ Each creative figure submitted a text with personal annotations and notes made directly onto it. The impressive reel of contributors – which spans three A4 content pages – includes Marina Abramović, Art & Language, Antony Gormley, Olafur Eliasson, Ragnar Kjartansson, Sarah Lucas, Alistair Hudson, Tony Chambers and Hans Ulrich Obrist.
Zeros + Ones, by Sadie Plant, 1997, annotated by British sculptor Alice Channer
Which text each creative figure picked is as revealing as what they scribbled on it. Kjartansson chose an extract by fellow Icelander and Nobel Prize winner Halldór Laxness; Eliasson chose Sensorium – Embodied Experience, Technology, and Contemporary Art, by Bruno Latour 2006; and Pedro Reyes, (who, along with his wife Carla Fernández, has just been awarded the Design Miami/ Design Visionary Award for 2018) picked Who Shall Survive?: Foundations of Sociometry, Group Psychotherapy and Sociodrama, by Jacob Levy Moreno, 1977.
Some of the annotations are elucidating: ‘Can my perspective through the camera be as open as these words?’ muses artist Rob Crosse at the close of Ash Wednesday, by Samuel R Delany, 2017. Some are instructional: ‘Worth straining your eyes for!’ writes artist Pavel Buchler on the almost illegible How I Write, written in tiny typewriter print by Viktor Shklovsky in 1930. Others still are filled with the mundanity of the everyday: ‘+ wine / + broccoli / + beans / + tampons’ reads a shopping list at the dogged-edge of SCUM Manifesto, by Valerie Solanas, 1967, as picked by British artist Rachel Ara.
The pages are haphazardly scanned into the book; a communal, global scrapbook of the digital age. ‘As a non-profit project, our hope is to create an educational resource that can be used as both a teaching aid for future generations alongside being an archive that captures personal mementos and unique perspectives from a variety of contributors that are at the forefront of our contemporary society,' write Gander and Watts. ‘The Annotated Reader will be a curriculum, an index and an ethics.
Will Happiness Find Me?, by Peter Fischli & David Weiss, 2003, annotated by William Cobbing
Introduction, Cartographic Cinema, by Tom Conley, 2006, annotated by John Bloomield
SCUM Manifesto, Valerie Solanas, 1967, annotated by Rachel Ara
Franny and Zooey, by JD Salinger, 1961, annotated by Uri Aran
INFORMATION
The Annotated Reader is on view at Cork Street Galleries from 2-13 October. For more information, visit the website
ADDRESS
Cork Street Galleries
9a-9b Cork Street
London W1S 3LL
-
Fendi celebrates 100 years with all-out runway show at its new Milan HQIn the wake of Kim Jones’ departure, Silvia Venturini Fendi took the reins for a special co-ed A/W 2025 collection marking the house’s centenary, unveiling it as the first act of celebrations within Fendi’s expansive new headquarters in Milan
-
‘Leigh Bowery!’ at Tate Modern: 1980s alt-glamour, club culture and rebellionThe new Leigh Bowery exhibition in London is a dazzling, sequin-drenched look back at the 1980s, through the life of one of its brightest stars
-
Inside the unexpected collaboration between Marni’s Francesco Risso and artists Slawn and SoldierNew exhibition ‘The Pink Sun’ will take place at Francesco Risso’s palazzo in Milan in collaboration with Saatchi Yates, opening after the Marni show today, 26 February
-
‘Leigh Bowery!’ at Tate Modern: 1980s alt-glamour, club culture and rebellion
The new Leigh Bowery exhibition in London is a dazzling, sequin-drenched look back at the 1980s, through the life of one of its brightest stars
-
‘Yay, To Have a Mouth!’: a London show explores our oral fixation, from Freud to fairytalesThis group show at Rose Easton gallery in east London, created in collaboration with Ginny on Frederick, uncovers our fascination with the mouth
-
High low culture and the sickly sweetness of Tootsie Rolls: Derrick Adams in LondonDerrick Adams plays with themes of Black Americana in ‘Situation Comedy’ at Gagosian London.
-
The Barbican as muse: composer Shiva Feshareki on bringing the brutalist icon to life through musicFor the last two years, British-Iranian experimental composer and turntablist Shiva Feshareki has been drawing on the Barbican’s hidden history as a gateway for her new piece. She talks to Wallpaper* about her Brutalist muse
-
Out of office: what the Wallpaper* editors have been doing this weekA taste of the dolce vita in London, some permanent artwork and a new eyeshadow palette – it's our editors' picks of the week
-
Daniel Arsham’s new monograph collates the works of the auto-obsessed American artist‘Arsham Motorsport’ is two volumes of inspiration, process and work, charting artist Daniel Arsham’s oeuvre inspired by the icons and forms of the automotive industry
-
'We need to be constantly reminded of our similarities' – Jonathan Baldock challenges the patriarchal roots of a former Roman temple in LondonThrough use of ceramics and textiles, British artist Jonathan Baldock creates a magical and immersive exhibition at ‘0.1%’ at London's Mithraum Bloomberg Space
-
Discover Rotimi Fani-Kayode's fluid photographs of the queer male body, on show in London‘Rotimi-Fani Kayode: The Studio – Staging Desire’ at Autograph ABP celebrates the work of the Nigerian-born photographer
