The Insistent Detail

Abstract

From June 30 to July 3, 1990, Michael Asher removes all the bookmarks in the psychology section of the Public Reference Library (Bibliotheique publique d'information [BPI]) at the Pompidou Center in Paris. Of the 1,202 volumes in this section, fifty-seven of them contained, in all, sixty-seven slips of paper.1 In removing each one, he notes where it came from, as well as its exact position in the volume. From July 9 to September 15, 1991, the walls of the Galeries contemporaines, he installs a spatial going from the horizontal to the vertical.2 In this transferral, spatially identical to the spaces in the library, Asher places each of the bookmarks in the same position as it had been in the book, using the varying size of the sheet of glass under which the bookmark is fixed to represent the format of the missing page. The placement of the paper fragment on the page varies, so that if the bookmark protruded from the book, then it protrudes from the glass. The only indication of the paper's mobility is that it is not glued to the support, simply immobilized by the pressure of the glass the wall. Thus, the fragment is not framed, merely protected by the glass, which is situated at eye level. As for the source of the bookmark, Asher looks up the book's catalog number, then places an enlarged version of the catalog entry the wall immediately above the slip of paper and the sheet of glass. Transferred onto the wall in black letters in a slightly dominant position, the entry reproduces the computerized catalog's typography and the usual bibliographical information: the author, the