Oscar Murillo: By Means of a Detour

An artist’s book-cum-diaristic account of one frenetic year in Murillo’s life

This publication presents a year in the life of Colombian artist Oscar Murillo (born 1986), whose work spans many mediums, exploring cross-cultural ties in the globalized economy. Following him from Croatia to New York to Berlin and beyond, By Means of a Detour chronicles a single year of the artist’s life. The year chosen, 2019, also serves as the culmination of the first ten years of Murillo’s much-acclaimed career–of constant travel, research and making work. The book’s form–printed on mock loose-leaf paper and scattered with iPhone screenshots and frenzied doodles–reflects the frenetic nature of Murillo’s life and the year he chose to document. The book’s inconsistencies and rough, unfinished appearance are the product of a collaboration with Olu Odukoya, whose anarchic and anti-authoritarian–or primitive, as he calls it–spirit have helped to produce a volume with particular design flair.