Yves Klein: With the Void, Full Powers

By Walker Art Center

The Idea

This catalogue accompanied the exhibition “Yves Klein: With the Void, Full Powers,” the first retrospective of the artist in the US for over 30 years. In addition to illustrating works within the exhibition, the catalogue also served as a complement to the show, with essays by Klein scholars, texts by Klein himself, and archival photographs of the artist.

The challenge of the cover was to find something representative for an artist who’s broad practice made it difficult to nail it down to a particular image or work. Klein was interested in how people experienced art beyond its context in the gallery, how it elicits emotions, physical reactions and multiple interpretations. By stripping away the details on the cover like the title, imprints, and other information, it transforms the book into an abstract object, blurring the distinction publication and a conceptual form, free of (or open to) meaning. Saturating the cover and book edges in International Klein Blue activates the form with its particular ultramarine energy, suggesting how his blue monochromes are experienced. The result is a mysterious blue object that opens to reveal work in wildly various mediums, many of which were precursors to ideas like conceptual art, installation art, performance art, and minimalism. In developing the content of the book, a group of texts by Klein were included, ranging from musings about the concept of kitsch, to the power of silence. A large number of archival images were used throughout the book, and in its own “Album” section, showing Yves Klein in many different situations from parties to performances. Together, all this documentation helped to bring Klein alive within the catalogue, his own voice and physical presence complementing the works in the exhibition.

Delivery of Work

As far as the book-buying public, this book is designed to act as a mysterious object among the shelves. It is hopefully a highly desirable and collectible book, and can act as one of the most iconic representations of Klein's work.

The Results

We definitely consider this a success from a production standpoint. IKB is a notoriously difficult color to attempt reproduce (for its brightness, density and depth of color) and many Klein books before this have dealt with it with mixed results. With the help from our printers, we custom mixed our blue to match actual IKB pigments we had on hand at the Walker, and they provided wet proofs throughout the whole process to make sure everything was as accurate as it could be. Our most important sub-client, the Klein Archives, remarked on how close we had come to capturing the blue. In addition to the production challenge, we are very happy with the pacing of the book, and the overview it provides of Klein's career. We hope it will become one of the most treasured of Klein's monographs.

Credits

 

Event Sponsors

Additional generous support provided by Lagunitas Brewing Comapny and The Fraternal Order of Eagles #34