The exhibition at Mudam is accompanied by a publication in two volumes. The first volume is dedicated to One Hundred and Fifty Years of Painting (2021). Tacita Dean knew that fellow artists Luchita Hurtado and Julie Mehretu shared a birthday and were exactly fifty years apart in age. Realising they were going to turn collectively one hundred and fifty years old in 2020, she filmed them in conversation in Luchita Hurtado’s Santa Monica apartment. The resulting 16mm film One Hundred and Fifty Years of Painting (2021) is a moment in time. In the sun-filled room, both painters talk freely together about life, death, motherhood and painting. This richly illustrated book includes a full transcription of their conversation and an essay by LACMA associate curator Jennifer King.

The second volume is dedicated to The Dante Project, a collaboration between choreographer Wayne McGregor, composer Thomas Adès and artist Tacita Dean, staged at the Royal Opera House in London in October 2021. Based on Dante Alighieri’s The Divine Comedy (1308–21), the ballet and Dean’s designs formed three distinctive parts mirroring Dante’s journey through the realms of the dead – Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso. This book, illustrated with an array of photographs from the performance itself, includes an essay by art historian Briony Fer, which places Dean’s body of work in the context of Dante’s long influence on artists.

Languages: English/French

Release date: 2022/2023

Pages: Two volumes in a slipcase, 120 pages (vol. 1) + 120 pages (vol. 2)

Contributors: Briony Fer, Jennifer King

Graphic Design: Martyn Ridgewell

Publishers: Mudam Luxembourg, Walther König