The body as flexible habitat, from Arakawa and Gins to Lyle Ashton Harris

Austrian artist and curator Anna-Sophie Berger here assembles a group of works that register the body as a habitat that can be imaginatively stretched, altered, modified, adorned, replicated or destroyed. The starting point for Berger were two designs for necklaces by the Surrealist Meret Oppenheim—one resembling a baby’s legs wrapped around a neck, and the other featuring a pendant with a grinning toothy mouth smoking a cigarette, designed to hang at the softest part of the throat. In a similar spirit, each work in Life and Limbs was chosen for its ability to trouble the limits of what a body can become: from the metamorphosis that comes from wearing a garment to complete transfigurations into surreal, new beings. This volume includes works by Arakawa and Madeline Gins, Moyra Davey, CoBrA, Sarah Charlesworth, Lyle Ashton Harris, Rosemarie Trockel and more.

Introduction by: Simon Castets
Text by: Annie Godfrey Larmon, Philipp Ekardt, Anna-Sophie Berger