Description
Book SynopsisThe Stampographer traverses the fantastic, anarchic imagination of Parisian artist Vincent Sardon (born 1970), whose dark, combative sense of humor is infused with Dadaist subversion and Pataphysical play. Using rubber stamps he designs and manufactures himself, Sardon commandeers a medium often associated with petty and idiotic displays of bureaucratic power, then uses those stamps not to assert authority, but to refuse it. He scours the Parisian landscape as well as the world at large, skewering the power-hungry and the pretentious, reveling in the vulgar and profane. In The Stampographer, there are insults in multiple languages, sadomasochistic Christmas ornaments, and a miniature Kamasutra with an auto-erotic Jesus. Sardon also wields the stamp as satirical device, deconstructing Warhol portraits into primary colors, turning ink blots into Pollock paint drips, and clarifying just what Yves Klein did with women's bodies. Yet Sardon’s razor-sharp wit is tinged with the irony of his exquisite sense of beauty. The stamps are rarely static—they have an animating magic, whether boxers are punching faces out of place or dragonflies seemingly hover over the page. Sardon’s work is provocative in its subject matter as well as in its process and dissemination: he not only stands defiantly outside the art world’s modes of commerce but his artworks (the rubber stamps themselves) are actually the means with which anyone can make a work of their own. The Stampographer introduces English-speaking readers to one of the most unusual and original voices in contemporary French culture.
Trade ReviewIntroducing English-speaking readers to one of the most unusual and original voices in contemporary French culture. * AIGA *
Sardon is firm about his practice, which is rooted at once in experience and “utter uselessness” (a stamp isn’t food, it isn’t a roof). There is a punky purity here too. -- Mairead Case * LA Review of Books *
Its pages produce a kind of alternate bureaucracy, a profane portal dedicated not to renewing your driver’s license but to spreading chaos and fatalism, one inky impression at a time. -- Dan Piepenbring * Paris Review *
Gorgeously uncouth, cynical, and—in moments—despairing, Sardon’s work primarily revels in a Dada-like spirit of playful inconsequence and good-natured goading, and it’s expertly captured here. * Publishers Weekly *
For me, the most exciting book of the Fall publishing season (featuring one of the best covers) is The Stampographer, which showcases the fantastic, anarchic imagination of Parisian artist Vincent Sardon … There are insults in multiple languages, sadomasochistic Christmas ornaments, and a miniature Kama Sutra with an auto-erotic Jesus. Sardon also uses the stamp as satirical tool and weapon, deconstructing Warhol portraits into primary colors, turning ink blots into Pollock paint drips, and clarifying just what Yves Klein did with women’s bodies. Whew! -- Steven Heller * Print Magazine *
