Title: Renegade Library
Artist (host): Lois Klassen
Contributors: There are numerous contributors to this project who are each listed on a catalogue inside each of the 20 boxes in the edition.
Date: 1998 and 2015
Language: The catalogue text was written in English. A Spanish language translation is available.
Box dimensions: 12 1/4″ (310 mm) x 10 1/4″ (260 mm) x 5″ (126 mm)
Cover: A black and white poster wraps an archival Hollinger Metal Edge box.
Edition: 20
Price: The boxes are freely distributed to active and public artist book collections and archives. One box is available to collectors here. Each box contains approximately 30 artist book titles from the 1998 mail art project, a catalogue from the original exhibition, 2 posters with the 2015 curatorial statement (one for packaging and one for archiving inside the box), and a full list of contents (with the catalogue numbers, names of artists and titles).
Also available from LFP – Renegade Library Poster with 2015 essay (box wrapper)
From 1996 to 1998, Renegade Library was a social practice and a collection of over 500 artist books. Originating with a mail art call for “collaborative mail art in book form,” this project brought over 700 artists from some 40 countries into dialogue. Developed for an exhibition by Lois Klassen at the Art Gallery of Southwestern Manitoba, the collection included ‘zines, assemblings, multiples, add & pass, miniatures, visual poetry, small presses, and much more. The archive, now in 20 mail-able boxes, are being distributed to public libraries and artist book collections around the globe.
Renegade Library Boxes are in circulation to accessible collections. They are found on this map and here:
Box #1 – Art Gallery of Southwestern Manitoba (Brandon, Canada)
Box #2 – Also As Well Too (Winnipeg, Canada)
Box #3 – Crista Dahl Media Art & Archives (Vancouver, Canada)
Box #4 – Emily Carr University Library (Vancouver, Canada)
Box #5 – Institute of American Indian Arts (Santa Fe, New Mexico, US)
Box #6 – Artexte Centre D’Information En Art (Montreal, Quebec)
Box #7 – Maurico Esquivel, Ernesto Bautisto, and Mauricio Kabistan Studio (San Salvador)
Box #8 – MoMA Archive and Library (NYC)
Box #9 – Wendy’s Subway (Brooklyn)
Box #10 – Publication Studio São Paulo
Box #11 – Centro de Desarrollo de las Artes Visuales (La Habana)
Box #12 – LOATAD (Library of the African Diaspora, Accra, Ghana)
Box #14 – 37 Looe Street (Plymouth, UK)
Box #15 – RRD (Red de Reproducción y Distribución, Ciudad de México)
Box #16 – microutopías (Montevideo, Uruguay)
