Batia Suter

Batia Suter’s work intuitively situates found images in new contexts to provoke surprising reactions and significative possibilities. ‘Parallel Encyclopedia’ contains a precise composition of images from other books. Underlying themes of the Amsterdam-based, Swiss artist’s practice are the “iconification” and “immunogenicity” of old images, and the circumstances by which they become charged with new associative values. This is a reprint of Suter’s voluminous book, originally published in 2007.

Publié par Roma pour l’exposition de Batia Suter à New-York, Cloud Service est un fanzine petit format souple reprenant une nouvelle série de l’artiste iconographique autour des nuages et de leurs formes.

Hexamiles (Mont-Voisin) has been published on the occasion of Batia Suter’s exhibition at the Mauvoisin Dam in Switzerland (built 2,000 meters above sea level, it is the highest dam in Europe). For this artist book, Suter focused on her ever-expanding archive of scanned landscape images, which had already started to play an important role in Parallel Encyclopedia #2 (Roma 284, 2016). Many of those images depict wastelands, alternating between romantic and menacing views which simultaneously create sensations of majesty and disorientation. By layering them over each other, a variety of disparate geological and biological environments merge into composite landscapes we might only recognise from dreams and fairy tales. In the books sequence, a kind of adventurous journey takes shape, pitched between an odyssey, a safari and paradise. The book’s title is derived from the term Hexameter, a poetic form of writing used in Homer’s Odyssey. Mont-Voisin, which also serves as the title for the exhibition, is inspired by different spellings used by 18th and 19th century travellers to describe Mauvoisin. Design: Batia Suter, Roger Willems.

Batia Suter’s work intuitively situates found images in new contexts to provoke surprising reactions and significative possibilities. This volume follows on from the first Parallel Encyclopedia, published in 2007. Underlying themes of Suter’s practice are the « iconification » and « immunogenicity » of old images, and the circumstances by which they become charged with new associative values. « In my work, I collect groups of images based on various themes and characteristics, and I investigate how they can manipulate each other, depending on where and how they are placed. In the process of making this book, narrative lines unfolded before my eyes as I shifted images around. » Design: Roger Willems. (from the publisher)