Lists of things

September 25, 2008 1:36 PM

Looking for artists, writers or blogs who work on lists of things.

I'm looking for things (on or off-line) in the spirit of Richard Serra's Verb List, or Georges Perec's classifications.

posted by OutlawedYeomen to writing & language (13 comments total)

Humorously, McSweeneys Lists (Several lists)
posted by shamble at 1:43 PM on September 25, 2008

Do Wikipedia editors count as "writers"? They have a ton of lists, including a list of all of their lists.
posted by burnmp3s at 1:50 PM on September 25, 2008

David Bunn makes a sort of list/poetry from abandoned library card catalog cards. Also here.
posted by R. Mutt at 2:23 PM on September 25, 2008

Merlin Mann makes lists of five here.
posted by reenum at 2:28 PM on September 25, 2008

If you're into Perec, you'll certainly find the work of other Oulipo writers interesting. For instance, you might look at Raymond Queneau's Exercises in Style and Cent mille milliards de poèmes.

It's just a short leap from there to some of John Cage's experimental writings, such as Writing for the Second Time Through Finnegans Wake.

Many Conceptual artists, like the members of Oulipo, are interested in combinatorics - look at Sol LeWitt's modular work such as Serial Project #1. And certainly you could consider John Baldessari's I will not make any more boring art, Throwing 4 Balls in the Air to Get a Square, and so on.

The work of both On Kawara and Roman Opałka could certainly be looked at in terms of lists.

Gerald Ferguson's The Standard Corpus of Present Day English Language Usage Arranged by Word Length and Alphabetized Within Word Length is pretty self-explanatory. Check out fellow Canadian artist Kelly Mark's I Really Should..., and perhaps some of her other work, such as Wallpaper.

Hope that's enough to get your list going!
posted by oulipian at 2:28 PM on September 25, 2008

The list element of Bunn's work is that each line in the poem is a book title from one of the catalog cards. In other words, a six line poem is actually a list of six book titles, chosen from the catalog and presented along with the cards themselves.
posted by R. Mutt at 2:32 PM on September 25, 2008

The List Universe
posted by asras at 2:34 PM on September 25, 2008

Ad Reinhardt made a list of things that art is not. "Art is not ..." etc. Can't google it up, though.
posted by londongeezer at 2:42 PM on September 25, 2008

I remember Schott's original miscellany having plenty of lists.
posted by ersatz at 2:43 PM on September 25, 2008

Art & Language - The process of indexing lies at the heart of the endeavours of Art and Language. One such project that will be included in the exhibition is Wrongs Healed in Official Hope, a remaking of an earlier index, Index 01, produced by Art & Language for the Documenta of 1972....
posted by R. Mutt at 2:50 PM on September 25, 2008

To add to my previous post: Thinking photographically, you might consider series of photos such as Ed Ruscha's books Every Building on the Sunset Strip, Twentysix Gasoline Stations, and Thirtyfour Parking Lots. In this vein, much of the work of Bernd and Hilla Becher, August Sander, and Eadweard Muybridge essentially consists of a series of photo-based lists.

Also, take a look at Daniel Spoerri's An Anecdoted Topography of Chance, and perhaps Peter Greenaway's 100 Objects to Represent the World.

In terms of artists working digitally, John F. Simon's Every Icon might be a good place to start, but there's plenty more out there.
posted by oulipian at 2:51 PM on September 25, 2008

I always loved To Do List Magazine. Now it's a blog.
posted by MsMolly at 6:07 PM on September 25, 2008 [1 favorite has favorites]

Wow. That's great, thanks y'all!

Here's another list I like: Tracey Emin's Everyone I Have Ever Slept With 1963-1995.
posted by OutlawedYeomen at 6:18 PM on September 25, 2008