Group items tagged

What is the perfect library, one that is so inviting you want to spend as much time as possible there? Perhaps it should be more like a living room? In 2010, Till Exit was commissioned to redesign the GfZK library. He decided to use lounge chairs and lamps from the 1950s and 1960s, in combination with newly designed tables and shelves, although at first glance it is not always clear which items are old and which are new. The interior design builds a bridge between the present and the past, and vice-versa. The title "Weltall Erde Mensch" refers to a book containing various utopian visions of the future; up until 1975, this was a traditional gift presented to young people at their "Jugendweihe", an East German celebration at which 14-year-olds are given adult status. Now, Exit transfers this utopian potential to the library; it is to be a place where you feel inspired to fantasise about the near and the distant future.

"Antonia Hirsch's The Surplus Library on Affect and Economic Exchange considers the library as a unique social space in which knowledge is circulated through a system of non-monetary trade or interpersonal exchange. The project's website displays cover images of books on the subject along with the email addresses of their owners, and an open invitation to participate in the completely inefficient process of borrowing a book via mail. (To be included in the library, a book must be deemed worthwhile by Hirsch.) By facilitating the global exchange of these books about exchange-containers for ideas, but also personal objects marked by marginalia, dog-eared pages, personal inscriptions-Hirsch examines the relationship between social bonds and the production (and consumption) of knowledge. The Surplus Library, begun in 2011, currently includes around one hundred titles. In the past two years, Hirsch has also edited Intangible Economies, a thematically related series of articles published in the Canadian art magazine Fillip, where she is an editor at large; an anthology of the same name was published in the fall. Triple Canopy's Brittany Paris discussed the project and the book with Hirsch over Skype and email in November and December."

The Library of Radiant Optimism for Let's Re-Make the World began with a mutual fascination for books from the late 1960s and early 1970s that shared the aesthetic and ethics of self-publication and self-education. These how-to books document cultural practices from the founding and maintence of communal living spaces and growing your own organic garden, to early sustainable design initiatives and home-birthing. The people and projects represented in the books selected for inclusion in the Library paved the way for today's environmental movement and sustainable design culture. The counterculture of this time took seriously the task of building the world they wanted to see.

The PMI Research Library is a collection of art, architecture and design periodicals . The library is a site of interaction and research for individuals interested in hard to find and unique publications. PMIRL was created to establish a dialogue about new urbanism, contemporary art, and graphic design in Chicago

"Comprising amore than 7,000 volumes selected from the books at her residence and studio in Brooklyn and academic office in New Jersey, the Martha Rosler Library is now accessible for public use through April 15, 2006."

Artist led library in Bandung.

online archive of the Brooklyn Art Library. Complete scanned sketchbooks

Welcome to the online archive of the Brooklyn Art Library. Complete scanned sketchbooks are being uploaded constantly, with new themes added each day. We'll be updating the interface and continuing to improve the catalog as the archive expands.

The Benjamin Andrew Footpath Library delivers a regular supply of books to homeless and disadvantaged people living in hostels and on the streets, and through community organizations.