Books by Matthew S. Witkovsky
Christopher Williams: The Production Line of Happiness
by Matthew S. Witkovsky, Mark Godfrey, Roxana Marcoci, Christopher Williams
A handsome volume charting the thirty-year career of a widely celebrated, American-born conceptual artist
Representing Christopher Williams’s first publication with a major American museum, this illuminating and unusual volume is equal parts artist’s book and exhibition catalogue. Over the course of his thirty-year career, Williams (b. 1956) has crafted photographs that engage—often through uncanny mimicry—the conventions of photojournalism, picture archives, and commercial imagery, as well as their sociopolitical contexts and implications. The book includes a trio of essays by curators Mark Godfrey, Roxana Marcoci, and Matthew S. Witkovsky, which explore Williams’s engagement with his artistic peers and predecessors, with cinema (particularly the film-essay), and with the methods and modes of display and publicity in the art world, in addition to a transcript of a talk Williams delivered on the work of John Chamberlain. These more conventional contributions are “interrupted” by additional historical and contemporary textual and visual materials that were selected by the artist himself and are occasionally presented in facsimile form. An exhibition history, bibliography, and illustrated list of works round out the publication.
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Josef Koudelka: Nationality Doubtful
A retrospective catalog featuring vintage prints as well as recent, unpublished work by an internationally acclaimed photographer
This retrospective catalog features vintage prints as well as recent, unpublished work by internationally acclaimed photographer Josef Koudelka (b. 1938). A leading member of the photo agency Magnum, co-founded by his close friend Henri Cartier-Bresson, Koudelka has been a legend since the publication of his unforgettable eyewitness photographs taken during the invasion of Czechoslovakia by Soviet-led troops in 1968. In addition to Invasion and Exiles, Koudelka’s most ambitious project, Gypsies, is featured with the complete set of twenty-two prints first exhibited in 1967. Koudelka’s impressive imagery is accompanied here by five essays that provide a thorough understanding of and appreciation for this outstanding artist, willfully independent and reclusive despite his renown.
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The Art of the American Snapshot, 1888-1978
by Sarah Greenough, Diane Waggoner, Matthew S. Witkovsky, Sarah Kennel
The impact of the humble American snapshot has been anything but humble. Any American who takes a snapshot contributes to a compelling and influential genre. Since 1888, when George Eastman introduced the Kodak camera and roll film, the snapshot has not only changed everyday American life and memory; it has also changed the history of fine art photography. The distinctive subject matter and visual vocabulary of the American snapshot--its poses, facial expressions, viewpoints, framing, and themes--influenced modernist photographers as they explored spontaneity, objectivity, and new topics and perspectives. A richly illustrated chronicle of the first century of snapshot photography in America, The Art of the American Snapshot is the first book to examine the evolution of this most common form of American photography. The book shows that among the countless snapshots taken by American amateurs, some works, through intention or accident, continue to resonate long after their intimate context and original meaning have been lost.
The catalogue of a fall 2007 exhibition at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC, The Art of the American Snapshot reproduces some 250 snapshots drawn from Robert Jackson's outstanding collection and from a recent gift Jackson made to the museum. Organized decade by decade, the book traces the evolution of American snapshot imagery and describes how technical, social, and cultural factors affected the look of snapshots at different periods.
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Revoliutsiia! Demonstratsiia!: Soviet Art Put to the Test
by Matthew S. Witkovsky, Devin Fore
Groundbreaking new insight into a rich spectrum of early Soviet art and its spaces of display
Published on the centenary of the Russian Revolution, this landmark book gathers information from the forefront of current research in early Soviet art, providing a new understanding of where art was presented, who saw it, and how the images incorporated and conveyed Soviet values. More than 350 works are grouped into areas of critical importance for the production, reception, and circulation of early Soviet art: battlegrounds, schools, the press, theaters, homes and storefronts, factories, festivals, and exhibitions. Paintings by El Lissitzky and Liubov Popova are joined by sculptures, costumes and textiles, decorative arts, architectural models, books, magazines, films, and more. Also included are rare and important artifacts, among them a selection of illustrated children’s notes by Joseph Stalin’s daughter, Svetlana Allilueva, as well as reproductions of key exhibition spaces such as the legendary Obmokhu (Constructivist) exhibition in 1921; Aleksandr Rodchenko’s 'Workers' Club in 1925; and a Radio-Orator kiosk for live, projected, and printed propaganda designed by Gustav Klutsis in 1922. Bountifully illustrated, this book offers an unprecedented, cross-disciplinary analysis of two momentous decades of Soviet visual culture.
Distributed for the Art Institute of Chicago
Exhibition Schedule:
V-A-C Foundation, Venice
(05/13/17–08/25/17)
The Art Institute of Chicago
(10/29/17–01/14/18)
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Moholy-Nagy: Future Present
by Jennifer King, Matthew S. Witkovsky, Karole Vail, Carol S. Eliel
An unprecedented study of an important 20th-century artist and his diverse body of work
This exceptional book offers a fresh and extensive examination of the work of pioneering artist László Moholy-Nagy (1895–1946). The first major American survey of his oeuvre in nearly a half century and the most extensive English-language book on the artist in thirty years, the catalogue offers an integrated presentation of Moholy’s production across a range of art forms including painting, sculpture, photography, graphic design, film, advertising, and theater.
Distinguished scholars offer new insights into Moholy's materials and working methods; the relation among writing, administration, and art making in his practice; and his influence on contemporary art. Particular emphasis is given to Moholy's American years and his leadership of the Chicago Bauhaus as well as his reception as a painter.
Over 300 works are illustrated in color, including the artist's early paintings and photograms, his whimsical photomontages---all of which are reproduced together here for the first time---and late works in Plexiglas. Beautifully designed and produced, with a PVC plastic jacket printed on the inside and a foil stamped casewrap, the book is a marvelous tribute to this phenomenally innovative artist.
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Dawoud Bey: Harlem, U.S.A.
In 1979, when African-American photographer Dawoud Bey showed twenty-five photographs at the Studio Museum in Harlem under the heading Harlem U.S.A., the exhibition offered a young artist's vision of a moment in the neighborhood's life. Published here as a complete set for the first time, Dawoud Bey: Harlem U.S.A. also includes five previously unpublished photographs from the same period. Bey's vintage images are given new context in an essay by emerging African-American writer Sharifa Rhodes-Pitts, who undertook her own fascinating study of Harlem in 2011.
Bey, who grew up in Queens with family roots in Harlem, has become one of most widely acclaimed portraitists on the contemporary scene. This handsome book, with faithful duotone reproductions, provides a wonderful opportunity to revisit a classic portfolio of images that still resonates in today's culture.
Distributed for the Art Institute of Chicago
Exhibition Schedule:
The Art Institute of Chicago(05/02/12-09/09/12)
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Sarah Charlesworth: Stills
This concise yet breathtaking book is the first publication of Sarah Charlesworth’s (1947–2013) photographic series collectively entitled Stills. Charlesworth made a name for herself as a member of the New York–based Pictures Generation artists when, in 1980, she produced this series of 14 large-scale photographs. Like her previous work, the images were appropriated from newspapers, which Charlesworth re-photographed. The images that comprise Stills hauntingly depict people falling or jumping from buildings, the suspended moment further dramatized by the photographs’ scale: Charlesworth’s prints measure over six feet tall. Seven of the 14 photographs were exhibited in 1980 at the apartment of the artist’s dealer, but the other half was not printed until 2012, when she created a unique artist’s proof edition from her original negatives for the Art Institute of Chicago. Until now, the full series has never before been published or exhibited together. Following an essay by Matthew S. Witkovsky, this landmark publication presents Stills in its entirety for the first time.
Distributed for The Art Institute of Chicago
Exhibition Schedule:
The Art Institute of Chicago
(09/17/14–01/04/15)
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Project a Black Planet The Art and Culture of Panafrica
by Matthew S. Witkovsky, Adom Getachew, Elvira Dyangani Ose, Antawan I. Byrd
An expansive look at more than a century of Pan-Africanist art and the ways it embodies the movement's principles and global ambitions
Since the term Pan-Africanism was coined around 1900, the movement's promise has been to foster liberation and solidarity for Black peoples worldwide. Focusing on its cultural expression, this book presents a rich selection of the visual, sonic, and other creative forms that have emerged throughout Pan-Africanism's evolution. Among the nearly two hundred artists represented from across the continent and the African diaspora are Beauford Delaney, Ibrahim El-Salahi, Hoyt William Fuller, Wifredo Lam, Simone Leigh, Ernest Mancoba, Zanele Muholi, Kawira Mwirichia, Cauleen Smith, Alma Thomas, and George Albert Yon.
Reflecting Pan-Africanism's ideals of diversity and dialogue as well as its aspirations to egalitarianism, essays from more than a dozen scholars, artists, and practitioners speak to a range of themes and places, while discussing works in all media made or circulated outside the infrastructure of fine art, including LP albums, illustrated magazines, and manifestos.
Distributed for The Art Institute of Chicago
Exhibition Schedule:
The Art Institute of Chicago
(December 15, 2024-March 30, 2025)
MACBA Museu d'Art Contemporani, Barcelona
(November 6, 2025-April 6, 2026)
Barbican Centre, London
(June 10-September 6, 2026)
KANAL-Centre Pompidou, Brussels
(Fall 2026-Winter 2027)
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