Since 2007, Art Basel has set aside an area at the fair (in the context of Art Unlimited) for a certain type of object: the artist record.
Aware that artists now use a growing range of formats and supports, Art Basel appointed Lionel Bovier, art historian and contemporary art editor, to take charge of this unique section of the fair.
The vinyl record has become a symbolic object of the 20th century. This is undoubtedly partly due to the fact that so many artists are aware of its advantages – it is relatively cheap to produce and easy to distribute – and have chosen to use vinyl as an artistic medium.
Christian Marclay, Rodney Graham or Jack Goldstein each have exploited all the various aspects of vinyl records – from the recording possibilities to the record sleeves themselves, pressing to printing, audio to visual.
In consultation with John Armleder and Ecart/Villa Magica Records (Geneva), the curator Stéphane Kropf gathered together the productions of several artists and set up a ‘record shop’ stocked with items from collections belonging to editors and the artists themselves.
This will provide a platform for an appraisal of emblematic artistic devices whilst also ensuring that projects in this form enjoy renewed distribution, albeit specific and limited to the time
span of the fair.
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