ΒΟΟΚ:Christo & Jeanne-Claude,Wrapped Book, Taschen Publications

From 18/6 to 3/716, 100 kilometers east of Milan and 200 kilometers west of Venice, “The Floating Piers” by Christo and Jeanne-Claude allowed 1.2 million people to walk on water. The project, comprising 100,000 square meters of shimmering saffron fabric atop a modular floating dock system of 220,000 high-density polyethylene cubes, created a three-kilometer walkway across the surface of Lake Iseo, connecting the mainland to the islands of Monte Isola and San Paolo. In his personal project book “Floating Piers, Art A, Wrapped Book” by Taschen Publications, signed and designed by Christo himself, the artist presents this extraordinary environmental work from start to finish. On 846 pages, he reveals the couple’s earliest concept of a floating surface on water back in 1970 through renewed interest in the project, research into possible locations, technical developments and material production. The limited Art Edition of 20 copies (No. 1–20) plus 20 Artist’s Proofs (No. I–XX), combines the project book with a 24 x 24 cm swatch of the project’s original dahlia yellow fabric as well the extraordinary artwork, Wrapped Book. In the celebrated wrapping tradition of Christo and Jeanne-Claude, this extremely rare piece nods to the artists’ wrapped objects and packages of the 1950s and ’60s as well as their larger scale wrapping projects around the globe, including Wrapped Reichstag and Wrapped Trees. Crafted in mustard-colored tarpaulin, it evokes both the Italian tradition of Arte Povera as well as the waterborne nature of The Floating Piers.-Efi Michalarou