The Sun, the Moon and the Stars: Peter Fischli and David Weiss

Sonne, Mond und Sterne is an 800-page artist’s book consisting of just as many images, inspired by an international selection of magazine advertisements and compiled and organized into loose categories by the influential Swiss artistic collaborators Fischli & Weiss. Designed in collaboration with the rising Zurich design firm NORM, this volume reconfigures Fischli & Weiss’ contribution to the Ringier AG Annual Report 2007. It is a revealing–and perhaps unnerving–look at the images and slogans that constitute our glutted contemporary media landscape. The viewer is plunged into a flood of imagery that, when taken out of its original commercial context, unfolds into unlikely open-ended narratives. Based in Zurich, Fischli & Weiss began collaborating in 1979 in a variety of media including photography, video and installation. They are perhaps best known for their playful The Way Things Go (1987), a video documenting the endless machinations of a Rube Goldberg-esque contraption that seems to have no practical purpose whatsoever. This volume, edited by Kunsthalle Zurich Director Beatrix Ruf, is a never-before-published work.