Text by Briony Fer
Edited by Honey Luard
Designed by Kellenberger-White
260 x 200 mm, hardback
206 pages, 121 colour illustrations
ISBN 978-1-910844-12-0
Published by White Cube, 2017

Designed in close collaboration with London-based graphic design studio Kellenberger-White and Gabriel Orozco, Suisai is the record of an intense period of work for the artist, culminating in a series of exhibitions around the world. The 2016 exhibition at White Cube Hong Kong from which this publication takes its title, was curated by academic, curator and writer, Briony Fer.

For the previous year, Orozco had been based in Tokyo and all the works in the publication were made in his apartment there. Although at first sight the installation of watercolour paintings, propped against walls and placed on shelves, may look startlingly different from some of his best-known works, it had, in fact, been made according to similar procedures and with the same intense interests in matter and process, movement and circulation. Using the materials that he found around him in Japan Orozco created a series of watercolours on gold cardboard grounds in standard sizes, all readily available in Tokyo art suppliers. The delicate watercolours on gold, in this context, is not a precious material but provides a light-reflective ground for exploring the material properties of watercolour.

The accompanying publication includes images of every one of the watercolours, with a text by the exhibitions’ curator Briony Fer, that weaves a rich narrative throughout. Conceived in close collaboration with artist and curator, this is an artist’s book.

Briony Fer, FBA is a British art historian, critic, and curator; Professor of History of Art at University College London. She has written extensively on diverse topics of 20th century and contemporary art.