Deluxe edition with two books:
I. Artists’ book version of all the elements of Adéagbo’s 1999 Venice Biennale installation
II. Artists’ book version of the installation to be unfolded on the ground
 
Book I
Pour les Collectioneurs d’Oveuvres d’Art, Monument Symbolique d’Allemaine
1999, 7/15, 28 pages, 9 by 10 inches, Xerox on transparent paper
 
Created for Georges Adéagbo’s The Story of the Lion installation at the 438th Venice Biennale in 1999. By Georges Adéagbo, Clemens-Tobias Lange, and Stephan Kohler.
 
“A few weeks after the Biennale opening, Adéagbo created an installation in my studio dedicated to the volume we had in production, which in turn became a book, his «l’edition de tête», entitled «Pour les collectionneurs d ‘oeuvres d’art, Monument symbolique d’Allemagne», was printed by him in Xerox on transparencies. Each of the elements of the installation, «written» on the ground, placing objects and manuscript sheets on it, becomes a page… and page after page they grew into a book. A simple binding in Sicilian Alcántara paper, gives the book its definitive final form.”- Clemens-Tobias Lange
 
This manifestation of the installation includes elements of Adéagbo’s large installation at the Biennale which explored the cultural and political collision between European and African history. As with much of his arts practice (which he has described as spells or incantations), this book uses appropriated images and texts from consumer, historical, and popular culture to build large, immersive, collage installations that critique European colonialism and celebrate African resistance and liberation.”
 
Book II
The Story of the Lion
By Georges Adéagbo, Clemens-Tobias Lange, aand Stephan Kohler
 
Photographs of Adéagbo’s installation, during: making of, opening and dismantling – for the 48th Biennale di Venezia on Campo dell’Arsenale. The photographs were printed on Washi paper and scanned for offset-printing.
Offset print, screen-print (on the boards of the binding), letterpress
Typeface: Bembo. Photographs: analog photographs by Stephan Köhler and Clemens-Tobias Lange
Texts by Georges Adéagbo in French.
Translation of the texts of the normal edition in English by Linda Struck and in German by Tobias Eisermann.
 
“Georges Adéagbo asked me to prepare a book as a memory of his installation at the Arsenale during the 48th edition of the Venice Biennale in 1999 with the theme “d’ APERTutto / APERTO über all”. A precarious installation, created outdoors. A rainy storm during the inauguration ceremony reduced the installation with papers and hundreds of objects while visitors were helping to save them from the storm.
 
For this artwork, Adéagbo received the Prize of the Jury the following day.
 
The Story of the Lion is a «non-book», to be read by placing its pages on the floor, just the way Adéagbo arranges his stories and his «spells». A special, collectible book on the meaning of art and its destiny.” – Clemens-Tobias Lange