FAHRENHEIT °451

2017, Site specific Installation,

Floor Mosaic, 100 sq., with around 950 abandoned, historic books

(Archive of the public library of Villemur sur Tarn France)

2 x Oil Paintings, 1 x Drawing

"Books have the same enemies as people: fire, humidity, animals, weather, and their own content." (Paul Valéry)

During a three months residency in the village Villemur sur Tarn (France) I found in the cellar of the municipality around 950 old books (from 1840 – 1989) in humid boxes. When asking where they come from, I was told, that these are the archive of the still active public library. Whenever a book isn’t borrowed by a person for more than four years, it is taken out of the collection and is replaced by a newer one.

The installation “Fahrenheit °451” is an around 100 sq. floor mosaic made with these books inside the abandoned bathhouse from 1930. When entering the room, the public was constrained to or, not enter the room and don’t see the installation, or, by entering, to walk on the books and violating them if they wanted to have a closer look.

The books where assured as a peace of art for an amount of 23.000 € before the opening.

The installation was thought to remain, until the space is restructured for about 9 month, but after the opening the scandalisation by the inhabitants about the walking on the books, was that big, that the municipality had to find a space and started to recover the books in an archive, now open to the public as the historical part of the public library.

In the main show, apart from the floor mosaic, the notebook with the names of the borrowers, two oil paintings and one drawing made with pictures from some of the books where shown.