Pavel Büchler - How To Make It Go Away

5 Jun – 3 Jul 2017

The exhibition is taking place at the Art Archive as part of the Polička/Shelf project.
In June’s Polička/Shelf we present How To Make It Go Away, an author’s book by artist and teacher Pavel Büchler. This Zen joke comprises a mere fourteen pages. But as  you page through it, you might for example be inspired to search out other interesting books by this author. The notebook on exhibit is a mere example of their varied range, and can thus perhaps also serve as a teaser.
Pavel Büchler is from Prague, but since 1981 has been living in Great Britain, where for many years he worked as a professor at the Manchester Metropolitan University a Glasgow School of Art. He has created a number of author’s books, graphic works of art, concepts, and installations, and even writes. You will find his thoughts on author’s books in the Bookworks anthology from 1982. He frequently quotes Carrióna, and even interprets his best-known text, The New Art of Making Books from 1975, in one of his own author’s books.
He has been devoting himself to these continuously from the 1970s until today, and they have become a natural means of expression for him. Communication itself is very fundamental here. Whether the works with words, images, or for example using interpretations, he does so in dialogue with us. His work is conceptual – and in this sense reasoned. All the more noticeable then are topics that are irrational, in which he makes a conscious effort to go beyond the limits of comprehension.
The notebook exhibited in Polička/Shelf, How To Make It Go Away, has a very inconspicuous form. It is a thin, wire-bound bundle of newsprint. Here, minimal means suffice.
The contents of the exhibited notebook comprise a sequence of fourteen instructional drawings illustrating the proper use of various cleaning products. The drawings even include arrows indicating cleaning movement, and the images are situated in the customary frames for instruction manuals and product leaflets. The pages are numbered in descending order, and thus on the last page we have  zero – and also spotlessly clean surfaces.
Anna Pleštilová