Boston Art Book Fair 2017

11 11/16 x 8 1/4 inches (29.7 x 21 cm)
20 pages / Unpaginated / Staple bound / Softcover
15 plates (1 photograph, Two Lines, words)
Offset (black-and-white)
Publisher: Secession, Vienna (A), on the occasion of the group exhibition The Fifth Column, September 9–November 20, 2011 /
curated by Moritz Küng
Printer: Ueberreuther Print GmbH, Korneuburg (A)
Print run: 500
ISBN: 978-3-902592-45-3

CATALOGUE RAISONNÉ NUMBER: 91

After having published in 1977 the three books, A PLACE – DÜSSELDORF, A PLACE – NEW YORK, and A PLACE – ___, Peter Downsbrough restarted the “series” after thirty-four years. As in the two first titles, this book contains twelve sets of Two Lines, the words a place and here, and one photograph taken in the city where the book was published, in this case, a view from Karlsplatz in the direct vicinity of the Secession in Vienna.

11 11/16 x 8 1/4 inches (29.7 x 21 cm)
32 pages / Unpaginated / Staple bound / Softcover
37 plates (drawings, film stills, photographs, squares, Two Lines, words)
Offset (black-and-white)
Text: Denis Gielen (French)
Publisher: Musée des Arts Contemporains du Grand-Hornu, Hornu (Belgium), on the occasion of the exhibition Le Miroir et les Chemins. Peter Downsbrough—Philippe Durand—Jacqueline Mesmaeker, July 8–October 14, 2012 /curated by Denis Gielen
Printer: not mentioned (Impresor Ariane,
Brussels (Belgium))
Print run: not noted (500)
ISBN: 978-2-930368-53-5

CATALOGUE RAISONNÉ NUMBER: 95

On the occasion of this three-person exhibition, each artist was given the possibility to do a catalogue, but Peter Downsbrough chose to make another book. The three volumes, each with the same width, but with a slightly different height, are presented together in a sleeve. The catalogues by the two other artists and the sleeve were designed by a graphic designer. Next to the sparse page designs with the typical visual elements (drawings, film stills, photographs, squares, Two Lines, words), Downsbrough’s book contains, at the very end an illustrated list of the sixteen photographs included in the exhibition which were shot between 1979 and 2011 in places such as Antwerp, Barcelona, Boston, Brussels, Cork, Kent, Munich, Las Vegas, New York, or San Francisco. The epilogue by Denis Gielen, in French, on the back cover, is an elaboration of a text fragment previously published in UNTITLED 5.11, and says: “More than space, more than places (which are only parts of it) it is advisable to speak about territories in regard to Peter Downsbrough’s pieces; singularly complex and maximalist territories in the sense that they are offered as many parcours and readings as possible along words, axes and black areas by which they are signaled and organized.”

7 1/2 x 4 15/16 inches (19 x 12.5 cm)
56 pages / Unpaginated / Stitch bound / Softcover with front and back flap
56 plates (brackets, photographs, squares,
Two Lines, words)
Offset (black-and-white)
Publisher: Coll.Part., Paris (France)
Printer: Cultura, Wetteren (Belgium)
Print run: not noted (400)
ISBN: none

CATALOGUE RAISONNÉ NUMBER: 97

This is the first book so far that has on every page —with the exception of the blank title page— a predominant square appearing either as a box drawing, a gray surface, or a cropped photograph, with occasional appearances of the Two Lines and words. Three photographs appear twice, two of them in mirror image: a windowless façade, a shack, and a garage entrance.

8 1/4 x 8 1/4 inches (21 x 21 cm) / 64 pages / Unpaginated / Stitch bound
Softcover, with tracing paper jacket 49 plates (bracket, drawings, map, photographs, words)
Offset (black-and-white)
Publisher: Editions Enigmatiques, Paris, France)
Printer: not mentioned (Alliance Partenaire Graphique, Reims, France)
Print run: not noted (300)
ISBN: none

CATALOGUE RAISONNÉ NUMBER: 98

In this book, Peter Downsbrough is following a strict visual concept, introducing a specific focus as was already the case in some previously published books: the Two Poles sculptures, a dice game inspired by Stéphane Mallarmé, a lecture following his first trip to Poland, the demolition of a brewery in Ghent, photographs taken in Munich, Calais, Lille and Valenciennes, a parking garage in Berkeley, California, double words, the reconversion of an industrial site in Aalst, flip books, or particular buildings by the French architect Roland Simounet. SET [ IN incorporates sixteen black-and-white photographs showing only quarry stones, brick walls, and concrete slabs in combination with thin horizontal lines, bold vertical bands, and words. Most particular is a mirrored map of the Sahara at the end of the book, with an advisory note about crossing the desert.

5/8 x 5/8 x 5/8 inches each (1.6 x 1.6 x 1.6 cm each)
Edition of 30
Signed on accompanying certificate
(Inventory #28733)

velvet bag
5/8 x 5/8 x 5/8 inches each (1.6 x 1.6 x 1.6 cm each)
Edition of 30
Signed on accompanying certificate
(Inventory #28743)

8 7/8 x 6 5/16 inches (22.5 x 16 cm)
88 pages / Unpaginated / Stitch bound / Softcover, with front and back flap
73 plates (drawings, film stills, grids, photographs, maps, Two Lines)
Offset (4 color)
Publisher: Material, Deal, Kent, commissioned by the Faversham Society, Faversham, Great Britain, concurrent with the publication of the DVD ]AND HERE
Printer: Cultura, Wetteren, Belgium
Print run: 750
ISBN: 0-9547889-2-3

CATALOGUE RAISONNÉ NUMBER: 78

This is the second book with a postcard on the cover, this time on the back. The postcard shows the first motel in France, in Le Touquet. Again Peter Downsbrough uses the grid in a structural way, at times filling the page and at times only partially on the page. For the first time he uses digital maps of Tokyo, Chicago, and Boston, along with partial maps of the Indian Ocean with parts of Indonesia and Australia, Boston, the Thames Estuary, including an aerial photograph of the latter. Among the more classic elements are words, lines, film stills, and black-and-white photographs taken in Kent.

9 x 6 in. (22.8 x 15.2 cm)
64 pages / Unpaginated / Stitch bound / Softcover
51 plates (drawings, squares, words)
Offset (black and white)
Publisher: Barbara Krakow Gallery, Boston, in conjunction with the exhibition, March 7- April 14, 2009
Printer: lulu.com
Print run: unlimited, on demand
ISBN: none

CATALOGUE RAISONNÉ NUMBER: 81

In this book, the first to be published in the United States in thirty-one years, Peter Downsbrough gives the black vertical band a width of one inch (2.54 cm). The use of relatively thin paper gives additional visibility to the complex interplay of entire words and half words, thin horizontal lines, the solid black bands and their outlined blank counterparts in a subtle way.

6 1/2 x 4 1/8 inches (16.5 x 10.5 cm)
72 pages / Unpaginated / Stitch bound / Softcover
69 plates, 3 sections (drawings, drawing by hand, grids, Two Lines)
Offset (black and white)
Publisher: La Verrière, Fondation d’entreprise Hermès, Brussels, on the occasion of the exhibition, April 25-June 27, 2009
Printer: not noted (Cultura, Wetteren, Belgium)
Print run: not noted (1,000)
ISBN: none

CATALOGUE RAISONNÉ NUMBER: 82

In this book Peter Downsbrough returns to the layout of his early books, in which the Two Lines are superimposed on a grid, with the difference that there are blank pages as well as pages partially covered by the grid. As suggested by the title, this book is subdivided into three sections, subtly marked by a number at the bottom of the right-hand page. Near the end of the book the word intersect appears in mirror image; on the page next to it is a small black-and-white photograph taken outside of Tempelhof Airport in Berlin. The Two Lines, a scan of the mark from the rubber stamp this time, are reproduced on the back cover.

TWO LINES TITLED 4.08 (left image)
6 1/2 x 4 1/8 inches (16.5 x 10.5 cm)
48 pages / Unpaginated / Stitch bound / Softcover
34 plates (grids, drawings, photographs, Two Lines, words)
Offset (duotone)
Publisher: Galerie Erna Hecey, Brussels, on the occasion of the exhibition Five Films and Two Books, April 23-May 16, 2009
Printer: not noted (Cultura, Wetteren, Belgium)
Print run: not noted (750)
ISBN: none

CATALOGUE RAISONNÉ NUMBER: 83

As with A CALAIS and REGROUP, and REFER – and REFER vol. 2, TWO LINES TITLED 4.08 and TWO LINES UNTITLED 4.08 are companion volumes. Again, the format and number of pages are identical, and the content is strongly related. In addition to the Two Lines, Peter Downsbrough again uses the grid on the full page or part of the page along with words printed at times in mirror image or else printed at different percentages of black, sometimes darker and sometimes lighter. As was done in TWO LINES, THRE SECTIONS (no. 82), which has a similar layout but a few more pages, the images in these two volumes are printed in duotone. Some of the elements overlap at times, as in the earlier book WITH ]IN – PLACE (no. 78).

TWO LINES UNTITLED 4.08 (right image)
6 1/2 x 4 1/8 inches (16.5 x 10.5 cm)
48 pages / Unpaginated / Stitch bound / Softcover
47 plates (grids, drawings, photographs, Two Lines, words)
Offset (duotone)
Publisher: Galerie Erna Hecey, Brussels, on the occasion of the exhibition Five Films and Two Books, April 23-May 16, 2009
Printer: not noted (Cultura, Wetteren, Belgium)
Print run: not noted (750)
ISBN: none

CATALOGUE RAISONNÉ NUMBER: 84

This book is similar in concept to the above title, but here the grid appears on all pages.

7 1/6 x 4 15/16 inches (18 x 12.5 cm)
104 pages / Unpaginated / Stitch bound / Softcover
51 plates (brackets, maps, photographs, squares, words)
Offset (4 color)
Publisher: Barbara Krakow Gallery, Boston (USA), on the occasion of the group exhibition, Surface Area, September 11-October 15, 2011
Printer: Cultura, Wetteren (Belgium)
Print run: not noted (500)
ISBN: none

CATALOGUE RAISONNÉ NUMBER: 90

As in the previous book BUT, the main element throughout the volume is a rectangular box drawing placed on the lower half of each spread. It contains several black-and-white and full color illustrations (cropped postcards and maps or a combination of the two) that are inserted in those rectangular shapes. Half words appear frequently inside or outside the box. Most particular in this book is the repeated use of cropped images of suspension bridges, one of which even appears three times towards the end: a cropped postcard of Le Pont de Tancarville in Normandy, once with the word SHIFT, once mirrored, and once with the word AND inserted. This is the third time cropped postcards are used.

6 5/8 x 4 1/8 inches (17 x 10.5 cm)

80 pages / Unpaginated / Stitch bound / Softcover

58 pages (drawings, words)

Offset (black and white)

Publisher: City Works, New York, and Sans Titre, Lille

Printer: EPO, Antwerp

Print run: not noted (1,000)

ISBN: none

CATALOGUE RAISONNÉ NUMBER: 55

This book contains words, lines, and rectangular areas that sometimes bleed, in black, white, or grey, negative or positive, at times in mirror image or upside down. The thin lines are placed horizontally or vertically, with the thirty-millimeter-wide rectangular areas always placed vertically.

56 pages / Unpaginated / Stitch bound / Softcover

52 plates (drawings, squares, Two Lines, words)

Offset (black and white)

Publisher: Maison Levanneur, Centre national de l’estampe et de l’art imprimé, Chatou, France, on the occasion of the exhibition, March 28 – May 31, 1998

Printer: EPO, Antwerp

Print run: not noted (1,000)

ISBN: 2-912483-02-6

CATALOGUE RAISONNÉ NUMBER: 56

Apart from the title and the author’s name on the spoine, the monochrome red cover of this book does not have any other information or illustration, a first in its kind so far. Close to POSE in layout, it contains squares and Two Lines and, in a few instances, lines with a little perpendicular end stripe as additional elements.

6 1/2 x 4 15/16 inches (16.5 x 11 cm)

72 pages / Unpaginated / Stitch bound / Softcover
70 plates (grids, drawings, squares, words)
Offset (black and white) + 1 PMS color (blue)
Publisher: Les Éditions Incertain Sens, Rennes
Printer: Sagittaire, Cesson-Sévigné
Print run: not noted (1,000)
ISBN: 2-914291-13-2

CATALOGUE RAISONNÉ NUMBER: 64

For the first time, a grid appears on the cover of a book by Peter Downsbrough. The page composition is fairly strict and determined by two elements: a vertical axis, which divides the page into two equal parts, and a square that is centered on this axis. Both do not always appear on the same page. At times, the outer half of the page is printed grey. The square can be white with a thin outline, grey, or filled with a 2.5 millimeter grid. Words appear throughout in various sizes, styles, and configurations.

6 7/8 x 4 3/4 inches (17.5 x 12 cm)
40 pages / Unpaginated / Stitch bound / Softcover
39 plates (brackets, drawings, drawings by hand, maps, photographs, squares, words)
Offset (black and white)
Publisher: Centre des arts contemporains / Centrum voor Hedendaagse Kunst / Wielemans-Ceuppens Project, Brussels, on the occasion of the group exhibition Wiels!, September 5-October 19, 2003 / curated by Luk Lambrecht Printer: Sintjoris, Merendree, Belgium
Print run: not noted (1,000)
ISBN: none

CATALOGUE RAISONNÉ NUMBER: 66

Published on the occasion of the exhibition organized by the newly founded Wiels Center for Contemporary Art in Forest in Brussels, this book mainly contains photographs Peter Downsbrough made in the immediate vicinity of the former brewery: viaducts, railroad tracks, fences, construction sites, and street corners. A partial map of Forest appears four times, twice in mirror image. The most surprising element is the second-to-last spread, which incorporates a partial map of Las Vegas on the left-hand side and its mirror image on the right-hand side. The spread is preceded on the previous page by a photograph of a mobile home in a mobile home park. The book is punctuated by a number of small words, and a few handwritten notes are included as well.

Catalogue, designed by Peter Downsbrough
6 15/16 x 5 inches (17.6 x 12.6 cm)
60 pages / Paginated / Stitch bound / Hardcover
58 plates (contact sheets, photographs)
Offset (black and white)
Text: Richard Klein (French, English)
Publisher: Jean-Michel Place photographie, Paris, on the occasion of the exhibition Roland Simounet à l’oeuvre, Musée d’art moderne de Lille Métropole, Villeneuve d’Ascq, October 21, 2000-January 28, 2001
Printer: France Quercy, Cahors
Print run: unknown
ISBN: 2-85893-729-X

CATALOGUE RAISONNÉ NUMBER: 68

On the occasion of a retrospective exhibition on the work of the French architect Roland Simounet (1927-1996) at the Musée d’art moderne de Lille-Métropole, Peter Downsbrough was commissioned to photograph nine buildings at the following locations: Saint-Denis, Villejuif, Paris, Évry, Cergy-Pontoise, Nemours, and Villeneuve d’Ascq. The photographs are always placed in the same position on the bottom half of the page. The book also contains nine full-page partial contact sheets (nos. 46, 48, 51) and a text by Richard Klein.

7 x 4 1/2 inches (17.7 x 11.4 cm)

96 pages / Unpaginated / Perfect bound / Softcover

96 plates (dots, drawings, words)

Offset (black and white)

Publisher: Peter Downsbrough, available through Printed Matter Inc., New York

Printer: Century Printing Company, Inc., New York

Print run: not noted (1,082)

ISBN: 0-9602192-0-X

LCCC: 78-65770

CATALOGUE RAISONNÉ NUMBER: 19

For the second time, Peter Downsbrough used a photographic bleed on both front and back covers, as in In Front. The image, which at first appears to be one photograph, is composed of two different vertical photographs separated by the spine; the pictures were taken in the same location but from slightly different angles. Particular to this book is that throughout there is a double horizontal line on each page, above which are placed either one or two words or four dots. This line is situated about an inch from the bottom of the page, with the exception of sixteen pages in the middle part in which the line-words or line-dots configuration is situated about an inch from the top of the page. This is also the first publication where the artist’s name does not figure on the cover, but only on the spine.

7 x 4 1/2 inches (17.7 x 11.4 cm)

112 pages / Unpaginated / Perfect bound / Softcover

71 plates, 5 chapters (photographs, Two Lines)

Offset (black and white)

Publisher: Peter Downsbrough, New York

Printer: Edwards Brothers, Inc., Ann Arbor, Michigan

Print run: not noted (992)

ISBN: 0-9602192-1-8

LCCC: 78-65771

CATALOGUE RAISONNÉ NUMBER: 20

Through the vertical approach, the cover of this book looks, at first sight, to be very similar to the previous one, AROUND. Yet in relation to its content and the Two Lines image in combination with urban photographs, it is connected to books such as BESIDE, A PLACE, and AND. New is the inclusion of a table of contents listing five chapters, the titles of which–“AS,” “TO PLACE,” “AND,” “TO PLACE,” “AS/AGAIN”–are not repeated in the book. Again, the Two Lines drawings are usually placed at the bottom of the page. The eight images are full-page vertical photographs of New York City street views. Because of the double vertical lines–comparable to the two lines on the spine of TWO PIPES, FOURTEEN LOCATIONS or the body of AROUND–the cover is divided in two halves, with a monochrome metallic blue plane on the left and a New York street view–one half of a vertical photograph–on the right. On the back cover, Peter Downsbrough placed a negative version of Two Lines.

7 5/8 x 5 3/8 inches (19.5 x 13.7 cm)

104 pages / Unpaginated / Perfect bound / Softcover

102 plates (collages, drawings, photographs, words)

Offset (black and white)

Publisher: Éditions Eric Fabre, Paris, following the exhibition, November 6 – December 5, 1981

Printer: Snoek-Ducaju & Zoon, Ghent

Typeset: Intergraphic, Ghent

Print run: not noted (1,000)

ISBN: none

CATALOGUE RAISONNÉ NUMBER: 22

In the late 1970s, Peter Downsbrough was looking to expand the vocabulary of the work, which involved, among other things, the introduction of dice. In this book, the artist responsible for the “mise-en-jeu, photographs, and mise en page,” introduces a new graphic approach that is radically different from his minimal style. The content is cearly inspired by Stéphane Mallarmés’s “Un coup de dés jamais n’abolira le hasard” from 1914. The book is a record of a dialogue between two people. Each “voice” was assigned two pairs of dice engraved with words on three or four faces per die: “take–or–cut, on–and–move, now–set–and–fix, again–again–or–hold.” The dialogue was determined by the words that came up after each throw of the dice, and photographs were taken (May 1981). Throughout the book, the dialogue formed by the words quoted above alternates with photographs of the dice themselves or of the hands throwing them, and with drawings of blank dice. The layout of this book is reminiscent of an abstract photographic novel. At the end of the book, each die is represented schematically. A photograph of a publicity pane–“Choisir c’est vivre”–is placed on the last right-hand page, followed, on the last page, by a smaller photograph of a blank pair of dice. The title, in large Helvetica outline, has a prominent place on the cover–a gradation from red to pink toward the spine. For the back cover, Downsbrough again chose a photographic bleed of a woman’s hand.