21.02.09 | 11.05.09

Oeuvre postale 1993 Alternating One to One Hundred and Vice Versa 1993 Anno 1990 (Year 1990) 1990 Mappa 1989 - 1992 Cartoline astratte 1987 Codice: Eritrea libera 1975 La Mole Antonelliana 1973 - 1975 Serie di merli disposti a intervalli regolari lungo gli spalti di una muraglia ( Serie di merli disposti a intervalli regolari lungo gli spalti di una muraglia 1971 - 1993 Permutazione e disegni (Lavoro Postale) 1973 Autodisporsi (Lavoro postale) (Placing oneself – Postal work) 1972 Otto lettere dall'Afghanistan Otto lettere dall'Afganistan 1972 Viaggi Postali 1969 - 1970 Dossier Postale (Postal dossier) 1970 - 1971 Lampada annuale 1966 Niente da vedere nulla da nascondere 1969 / 1986 Colonna 1968 Mimetico 1967 12 forme a partire dal 10 giugno 1967 1967 - 1971 Territori occupati Territori occupati 1969 Ordine e disordine 1973 AW:AB=L:MD 1967 Gemelli 1968 Shaman Showman 1968 Io che prendo il sole a Torino il 19 Gennaio 1969 1969 / 1992 Cimento dell'armonia e dell'invenzione 1969 Strumento musicale 1970 The Sighted 1967 Pile 1966 Untitled (Radial Turntable, Zenithal Turntable) 1969 Untitled (Stella Performance) 1969 Petite composition en bois 1962 Senza Titolo 1965 Untitled 1965 Insicuro noncurante 1972 - 1976 Mettere al mondo il mondo 1972 - 1973 Onomino 1973 Iter-vallo 1969 / 1986 AEB 197 la metà e il doppio 1974 Autodisporsi 1974 Autodisporsi 1974 Storia naturale della moltiplicazione 1974 - 1975 Ciò che sempre parla in silenzio è il corpo 1975 Tracce del racconto 1976 I sei sensi 1973 Il dolce far niente 1975 Order and disorder 1979 Vento 1985 Wind 1985 The thousand longest rivers in the world - project 1975 Nature, an obtuse matter 1980 Twenty-five times twenty-five six-hundred twenty-five letters 1988 La natura, una faccenda ottusa[Nature, an obtuse matter] 1980 Animal Kingdom – Within oneself 1978 Musical Kingdom – Within oneself 1979 Kingdom of maps – Within oneself 1979 Tra sé e sé [Within oneself] 1987 Everything) 1988 Self-portrait 1993 / 1996

Alighiero Boetti

Classifying, the thousand longest rivers in the world

1977

Courtesy :

Published in 1977, Classifying, the thousand longest rivers in the world collects the research work done by the author together with Annemarie Sauzeau from 1970 to 1973 to classify the 1000 longest rivers in the world. Partly inspired by his memories of synoptic tables used in school, partly by the book by the German author Albert Hochheimer, Il romanzo dei grandi fiumi (The novel of the great rivers) [published in Italy in 1956], Boetti embarks on an enormous documentation work, involving geographical institutes, governments, universities, private research centres and individual scholars all over the world, finding himself facing the inconsistencies of fallacious measures which we expect to provide us with certainties. This work thus focuses on the issue of error, developed through paradox; it shows the powerlessness of rational scientific thought in defining the identity and entity of a sensible reality which is elusive and fluctuating by its own nature. But if all measures are inaccurate and thus erroneous, they are also all simultaneously true in the artist’s classification. Indeed, this seems to be another trait of Boetti’s research: « composing the world's aporias in the space of art » [L. Cherubini 2004].  In 1975 Boetti realizes three projects for two monochrome enbroderies of great dimensions, where names of The thousand longest rivers in the world appeare without interruption in typefaces similar to that of first computers - as well as to Breil writing.

 

The thousand longest rivers in the world - project

1975

Published in 1977, Classifying, the thousand longest rivers in the world collects the research work done by the author together with Annemarie Sauzeau from 1970 to 1973 to classify the 1000 longest rivers in the world. Partly inspired by his memories of synoptic tables used in school, partly by the book by the German author Albert Hochheimer, Il romanzo dei grandi fiumi (The novel of the great rivers) [published in Italy in 1956], Boetti embarks on an enormous documentation work, involving geographical institutes, governments, universities, private research centres and individual scholars all over the world, finding himself facing the inconsistencies of fallacious measures which we expect to provide us with certainties. This work thus focuses on the issue of error, developed through paradox; it shows the powerlessness of rational scientific thought in defining the identity and entity of a sensible reality which is elusive and fluctuating by its own nature. But if all measures are inaccurate and thus erroneous, they are also all simultaneously true in the artist’s classification. Indeed, this seems to be another trait of Boetti’s research: « composing the world's aporias in the space of art » [L. Cherubini 2004].In 1975 Boetti realizes three projects for two monochrome enbroderies of great dimensions, where names of The thousand longest rivers in the world appeare without interruption in typefaces similar to that of first computers, as well as to Breil writing.
 

The thousand longest rivers in the world - project

1975

Torino 1940 | Roma 1994
I always find myself talking about the notion of double, which […] is present in all my work. The truth is that it is a natural reality: it is incontrovertible that a cell ...
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