This week, Glenn Horowitz Bookseller will open its new Manhattan gallery space Rare, along with the inaugural exhibition. Located on West 54th Street, across the street from MoMA’s sculpture garden, the 1,000-square-foot gallery will showcase first editions, manuscripts, letters, archival materials, fine art, and decorative arts spanning the 19th century to contemporary. Its first exhibition, titled “Matter/Giacometti,” opens this Thursday, January 15 (with a reception from 6 to 8 p.m.) and will examine Swiss designer and photographer Herbert Matter’s book of the same title.
The book is an intimate portrait of the (also) Swiss artist whose signature tall, thin, figurative sculptures (the results of years of experimentations with movements like abstraction and surrealism) have become famous worldwide. But Matter’s book is a highly personal project that took 25 years to create, published after his death in 1986 by his wife. For its debut exhibition, 26 photos of the artist at work taken by the designer during their more than 30-year friendship, along with hand-written notes, photo negatives, typeface designs, and other ephemera from the book’s production, will be shown to the public for the very first time.
Rare will also host lectures, readings, and exhibition-related panels. After “Matter/Giacometti,” the gallery’s program will feature exhibitions on architect James Evanson’s furniture and lighting designs, the Constructivist graphics of 1920s Soviet cinema, artist Sari Dienes, and contemporary pop-up books.
