Ecstatic Archive is a monograph of Gerhard Marx’s exhibition of cut and reconstituted map fragments at Goodman Gallery, Johannesburg, 2019.

From the exhibition press release:

“In Ecstatic Archive Marx replaces the original scientific purpose of maps with a discursive one. Through this work, writes Pieterse, Marx ‘exposes the map as fetish… render[ing] traditional cartographic representation as inherently strange and arbitrary’ resulting in ‘maps of allusion instead of maps of authority… [which] occupy a hinge position between contested pasts and uncertain digital futures.’

Speaking on his use of materials Marx says, 'The physical world haunts these maps and there is always this sense that by altering the map one can affect reality, which really means by shifting the way you look, one can affect what is seen.'"

Published by Goodman Gallery, the book includes essays from Sean O’Toole, Edgar Pieterse and Alexandra Dodd.

21 x 28.5 cm | 111 pages | softcover

Gerhard Marx (b.1976) is a South African artist working with sculpture, performance and drawings. In 2013 Marx’s work was selected for the South African pavilion at the Venice Biennale.