o.T. (Buch # 2_Liebe & Lyrik sind zweckfrei), filmed in December 2007

The exhibition includes twelve artist’s books, dating from the late 1990s to 2015. Two early books are additionally integrated in the exhibition as video projections. The videos show the artist navigating the stories of her imagined world.

Liebe & Lyrik sind zweckfrei (Etwas außerhalb der Legalität) (1998–99) is an exception among the artist’s books on display, since Galli did not work on a blank book but rather used an exhibition catalog whose contents she made her own by overpainting, appending, altering, inserting type, and working on the pages with scissors. The exhibition catalog, the origins of which remain unknown, was edited by the artist to the point of rendering its original version unrecognizable. Symbols and figures are trimmed to their edges and permeate the entire book in a narrative manner. Trimming and editing allow Galli to move her figures through her stories, into new settings with each turn of the page. Text enters the work, for example, in the form of the sketched and trimmed words SCHAM and MASS. SCHAM (shame) and MASS (bulk), on the one hand, are terms that stand for themselves. While SCHAM suggests a context for the work, the term MASS is perhaps more ambiguous. At the same time, Galli uses the conjoined SCHAMASS to refer to a term from the Saarland region of Germany describing disorder and chaos. The enlarged letter forms frame a walking figure in white at the center, with outstretched arms in black on the back. The pacing of the line and characters lend a surreal quality to the narrative, which is guided only by a thread of collage work, reminiscent of the visual techniques of Kurt Schwitters or Hannah Höch.