Gustav Metzger: Writings 1953-2016

Bringing together more than 350 texts written between 1953 and 2016, this comprehensive volume establishes artist and activist Gustav Metzger (1926-2017) as one of the towering figures of the 20th century, a long-overdue recognition of Metzger’s influential vision.

Renowned for his use of unstable materials and chemical reactions to create artworks that embody processes of change, destruction and renewal, Metzger was also a prolific writer, theoretician and satirist. His interest in technology and science and his anti-nuclear activism influenced his development of the concepts of auto-destructive and auto-creative art, terms he coined with his manifestos on Auto-Destructive Art in 1959 and Auto-Creative Art in 1961. He put these ideas into action with artworks made to decay, disintegrate or change following natural processes.

Edited by Metzger’s long-time friend, curator Mathieu Copeland, this anthology of writings makes Metzger’s essential thinking from the 1950s onward available to a wide audience. It includes seminal writings such as Metzger’s manifestoes of auto-destructive and auto-creative art, his essays about architecture, and an interview with R. Buckminster Fuller from 1970 and a retrospective manifesto on his own legacy, Remember Nature, from 2013. Also included are examples of Metzger’s art criticism, political lampoons and lectures. Altogether Gustav Metzger: Writings presents a challenging reading of our artistic, political and technological moment as analyzed by one of our most pioneering, discerning thinkers.