JONATHAN MONK, Push or Pull?, 2012
30 x 20 x 0,8 cm
anodized aluminum door sign, transparent perspex
signed and numbered on certificate, edition of 20 + 3 A.P.
More Publishers, Brussels, Belgium
inv.JMon 000
In 2006 Jonathan Monk told David Shrigley in an interview: “I now think the only thing that stayed with me after art school was the idea of context. What and where things are placed in relationship to other things in the world.” The work ‘Push or Pull?’ could be quite well considered as such a thing, the more since the question mark seems to refer to anyone who stands in front of a glass door swiftly deciding either to push or pull. If this sign would be mounted on a glass door in a practical way, the question mark in the title would’t make much sense apart from being very practical for getting a door open in the right way. In order to safe the interrogative part in this work one could easily imagine to mount the transparant persex door sign in a non-practical way on a glass door. Meaning that if one pushes the door it will be blocked and at once the question is raised: ‘Push or Pull?’. KvG May 2013
JONATHAN MONK, Picture Post Card Posted from Post Box Pictured – Edinburgh, 2005
10,5 x 14,7 cm
offset postcard
signed
published by Show & Tell Editions, Edinburgh, UK
inv.JMon 323-324
JONATHAN MONK, The making of ten posters, ten languages, ten colours, ten words, ten euros, 2011
book, 50 pp.
17 x 11,5 x 0,5 cm
50 pages of color photographs documenting the creation of an edition of Jonathan Monk posters
published by Yvon Lambert, Paris, France
pristine
set of 5: € 290,- plus € 20,- registered mail Track & Trace
inv.JMon 000-pr
Also available
As issued, stack of all the ten books in different colours, in original cellophane wrapping
pristine
set of 10: € 920,- plus € 20,- registered mail Track & Trace
inv.JMon 304-pr
Jonathan Monk: “… Once something has been done, it can be done again in a different colour.”
From studio interview by U. G. Lambert, 26 April 2012.
JONATHAN MONK, The Magnetism of Colour, 2016
94 x 68 cm
silkscreen print on 150 gas C-mat paper, set of 10 magnets on cardboard base
signed on sticker, numbered
edition of 25 + 5 A.P.
(does not include a vitrine)
published by More Publishers, Brussels, Belgium
This print comes with a set of 10 colored magnets to hang the print on. The edition is signed and numbered on a adhesive label, glued on the back of the package of magnets.
This edition is part of a so-called Public Poster Program initiated by the More Publishers in Brussels. The show cases they are presented in are on display in Belgium at MuZee in Ostend, MuhKA in Antwerp and KASK in Ghent. Each month a new poster is launched on the theme time and space. More info at link: http://www.morepublishers.be/series/260
Basically a set of ten colour magnets on a piece of white cardboard is offered, but Jonathan Monk’s edition would not be a (typical) Monk piece if he wouldn’t make a repetition by having it simply reproduced. And that’s what he did using a poster as a vehicle of that drive, so characteristic for his way of working.
JONATHAN MONK, Hand Painted by Hand, 2015
26,7 x 19 cm
gouache on digital photographic fiber based matt paper
unique hand painted series of 25, here number 3/25
pristine condition, with waves in paper as issued
published by Camden Arts Centre, London, UK
inv.JMon 1097
available at publisher
This edition shows the hand from Bas Jan Ader’s work I’m Too Sad to Tell You, with the background painted by hand by Jonathan Monk. The latter is known for emphasizing the simplicity inherently present in a working plan like painting a background of a hand by his hand. Any subject is allowed as long as the obvious can be banally pushed further: “… Once something has been done, it can be done again in a different colour.” By means of doubling and repeating the result has most of the time the effect of a Fluxus-like humor.
Together with artists like Yann Sérandour, Claude Closky, Nicolas Chardon, Martin Creed a.o. Jonathan Monk belongs to a generation that is – apparently being impressed by historical mile stones – making use of references to works of famous colleagues in the past.
JONATHAN MONK, Finger Food, 2014
diameter 11 inches
series of 9 different colours
edition 10 (each colour)
signed, numbered on certificate
published by Art Metropole, Toronto, Canada
€ 1.050,- plus € 24,- registered mail
Jonathan Monk says about choices: ‘Once something has been done, it can be done again in a different colour.’ This certainly is again executed in his ‘Finger Food’ edition of dinner plates. A series of off-white ceramic dinner plates, each with two glazed thumb prints on the top and the remaining eight finger prints on the bottom side is produced in nine colours and are sold individually in red, rose, pink, black, grey, blue, dark blue, violet and light green.
JONATHAN MONK, Soft Boiled Egg, 2013
colour film; super 8, DVD
hand spray painted on top of cardboard box, signed, dated and numbered certificate
series of 10 unique films
published by CEC /Centre d’Édition Contemporaine, Geneva, Switzerland
not available
Each work ‘Soft Boiled Egg’ is unique, since its duration is related to the time of boiling the amount of eggs shown in each film. So edition 8/10 shows eight eggs boiling in a pan with water.
History of prices:
CEC, Geneva price in year of issue € 2.000,- / SFr 2.500,-
JONATHAN MONK, A controlled chance encounter, 2012
74 x 36 x 2 cm
spray paint, cardboard mailing wrap
signed, numbered
edition 14 + 4 AP
published by Monopol – Magazin für Kunst und Leben, Berlin, Germany
not available
Jonathan Monk has chosen to use the inner side of a cardboard mailing envelope after he walked in his studio over such a mailing wrap protecting the floor for paint stains. In this envelope a recent Monopol Magazine is send to the addressee. The 14 copies + 4 AP’s of the edition differ slightly from each other. The work is finished when the magazine and envelope is mailed and after receipt is opened, the magazine may be taken out and is either pinned on a wall, framed or merely put on the table. Jonathan Monk comments: ‘Eventuelle Dellen oder Kratzer auf dem Postweg machen das Werk nur schöner!’
History of price:
Monopol – Magazin für Kunst und Leben, Berlin € 900,- December 2012 (year of issue)
JONATHAN MONK, Dada Necklace, 2012
MDF, brass plated steel chain, silver spray paint on cardboard
73 x 37 cm / 9,4 x 10,3 cm, chaîne: 90 cm
edition 100
produced by Galerie de Multiples, Paris, France
With this piece it seems that Jonathan Monk responded to the Dada bracelet of his French collegue Claude Closky who is known for making Appropriation art using advertising, fashion and commodity items. Closky made a fashionable bracelet ‘Dada DIY’ referring to the protest movement Dada, as well as to a fashion brand like Prada, making his bracelet into a kind of double Appropriation art. Jonathan Monk is known for recycling ideas of established artists and probably in turn decided to make his own necklace out of the four letters with chain, as a triple appropriated art work.
History of prices:
Galerie de Multiples, Paris, France € 150,- October 2012
JONATHAN MONK, It’s a Newspaper, 2012
68 x 45 cm
3 newspapers, available in pink, red or blue, 16 pp.
published by Yvon Lambert, Paris, France
“It’s a Newspaper” was first distributed during the opening of “It’s a Circus,” Jonathan Monk’s exhibition at Yvon Lambert in Paris from March 10 – April 8 2012. The newspaper explains the origin of Monk’s project through a series of photographs. For his exhibition at Yvon Lambert Monk presented 23 monochromatic paintings that were installed by a circus troop following a precise choreography dictated by the artist. What happened in the main room of the gallery was documented with 23 photographs to be on show in the second room.
History of prices:
Yvon Lambert, Paris, France € 3,- each, November 2012
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