The exhibition DARK MATTER explores how visual artists use self-produced and self-published books. Inspired by the book Dark Matter by Swedish poet Aase Berg, the exhibition serves as a performative presentation of the book, especially for New Delhi. On the eve of the millennium, Berg described dark worlds: Dovre’s slate mill, inhuman narrators with fins and feathers, black foam from oil horses, and Aniara – a spaceship turned sarcophagus for the rest of humanity. First published in 1999, Berg’s book is a dark warning that now seems to threaten reality. Themes of plague, war, and apocalypse echo writings by Lovecraft, Deleuze, Guattari, and others, growing like mushrooms.

In Stockholm’s presentation, Berg set up portals to black holes in city libraries using NASA photographs interpreted by Swedish photographer Tom Benson. This exhibition studies dark matter through the lens of the artist’s book genre, presenting 40 books and authors from eight countries. Artist’s books, rooted in the samizdat traditions of the post-Soviet space, offer young and mature artists a complete artistic statement in difficult markets. They are affordable and collectible, like Nadia Adina Rose’s velvet branches spelling an apocalyptic yet hopeful word, George Averin’s phone to dark worlds, or Lera Lerner’s Non-Clair-Voyant Tarot Deck, merging post-human and human.

These books-zines, photo books, art diaries-are confessional and tactile, like Maria Arendt’s clothes-book with her sculptor grandparents’ diaries. They reveal inner worlds, often as art therapy or cries for help.

Curated By: Nadezjda Voinova