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Vincent Sardon - The Stampographer

Siglio 2017 ISBN 9781938221163 Acqn 27702
Hb 20x27cm 108pp 200col ills 28.50

The Stampographer traverses the fantastic, anarchic imagination of Parisian artist Vincent
Sardon (born 1970), whose dark, combative sense of humour is infused with Dadaist subversion
and Pataphysical play.

Using rubber stamps he designs and manufactures himself, Sardon commandeers a medium
often associated with petty and idiotic displays of bureaucratic power, then uses those stamps not
to assert authority, but to refuse it. He scours the Parisian landscape as well as the world at large,
skewering the power-hungry and the pretentious, revelling in the vulgar and profane.
In The Stampographer, there are insults in multiple languages, sadomasochistic Christmas
ornaments, and a miniature Kamasutra with an auto-erotic Jesus. Sardon also wields the stamp
as satirical device, deconstructing Warhol portraits into primary colours, turning ink blots into
Pollock paint drips, and clarifying just what Yves Klein did with women's bodies. Yet Sardons
razor-sharp wit is tinged with the irony of his exquisite sense of beauty. The stamps are rarely
staticthey have an animating magic, whether boxers are punching faces out of place or
dragonflies seemingly hover over the page.

Sardons work is provocative in its subject matter as well as in its process and dissemination: he
not only stands defiantly outside the art worlds modes of commerce but his artworks (the rubber
stamps themselves) are actually the means with which anyone can make a work of their own.
The Stampographer introduces English-speaking readers to one of the most unusual and original
voices in contemporary French culture.

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Anouck Durand - Eternal Friendship

Siglio 2017 ISBN 9781938221149 Acqn 27701
Hb 18x24cm 100pp 200col ills 31.50

This exquisitely composed photo-novel by French artist-writer Anouck Durand (born 1975)
collaged from photographic archives, personal letters and propaganda magazinestells a true
story that begins in Albania during World War II, stops in China during the Cold War, and ends in
Israel after Communism crumbles.

When the Nazis invaded Albania, teenage partisan Refik Veselis Muslim family hid Jewish
photographer Mosha Mandil, his wife and two small children. Despite the dire circumstances,
Mosha instilled in Refik a great passion for photography, and a friendship was forged in the
crucible of war. After liberation, the Mandils left for Israel, inviting Refik to join them, but he stayed
behind to contribute to his new nation, not knowing hed never see his dear friend again.

In a nuanced, wholly imagined story, Durand inhabits Refiks voice as he narrates his journey to
China wherefree of Albanian state censorshe attempts to mail a letter to Mosha. She also
reveals how photography, used at the behest of merciless state powers, becomes a tool for
liberation and human connection. Says Richard McGuire, author of Here: "A timely book about
dictatorships, propaganda and friendship. Imagine Art Spiegelman meets Chris Marker, told in
gorgeous tricolor photography, a knock out!"

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