Rachel Valinsky invites seven artists from both sides of the Atlantic to share their views of Guy de Cointet, with contributions by Davide Balula, Eva Barto, Julie Béna, Jesse Chun, Jean-Pascal Flavien, Gordon Hall, Alan Reid.

Guy de Cointet was fascinated with language, which he explored primarily through performance and drawing. His practice involved collecting random phrases, words, and even single letters from popular culture and literary sources—he often cited Raymond Roussel’s novel Impressions of Africa as influential—and working these elements into non-linear narratives, which were presented as plays to his audience.

Initiales is an art and research biannual magazine published by the École nationale supérieure des beaux-arts de Lyon, the fifth issue is dedicated to Andrea Fraser. With contributions by Kader Attia, Eva Barto, Daniel Buren, Claire Fontaine, Dora García, Thomas Hirschhorn, Sven Lütticken, Chus Martínez, Jean-Luc Moulène amongst others.

In this book, the 1923 manifesto ‘Active Art’ by Latvian philosopher Andrejs Kurcijs triggers a series of responses by writers, artists and curators on the notion of activism, past and present: art for political purposes, art for its own purpose or art with no purpose. All the texts collected in this volume aim at considering the active part of writing according to the definition given by Kurcijs. It is true of the book design by Laure Giletti and Gregory Dapra too. Contributors include curator Rebeka Põldsam, artists Evita Vasiļjeva and Eva Barto, writers Bella Marrin and Robert Glück, and poet Laura Boullic. It also includes the reprint of an essay from 1987 by James Baldwin, commissioned by the African Center in New York, and an in-depth conversation between the editors of the books and philosopher Ainārs Kamoliņš.

In his catalogue essay, curator Anthony Huberman explains that the works in this exhibition ‘reflect on what it could mean to contest the regime of the machine’. That is, they question the worship of usefulness in modern scientific civilisation, which is refused or even ridiculed by each piece on show. It’s a strong concept, and potentially extends to how the works are placed in the labyrinthine space of the Secession. If the point is to produce friction, then the disorganisation of Other Mechanisms—the inability of its parts to add up to a coherent whole—is a paradoxical form of success.

Concept: Anthony Huberman. Texts: Jennifer Alexander, Franco Berardi, Benjamin H. Bratton, Gilles Châtelet, Gilles Deleuze, Keller Easterling, Vilém Flusser, Sigfried Gideon, Martin Heidegger, Anthony Huberman, K.G. Hultén, Maurizio Lazzarato, Pamela Lee, Les Levine, Jean-François Lyotard, Robert King Merton, Meredith Meredith, Lewis Mumford, Gerald Raunig, Nishant Shah, Robert Snowden, Joseph Vogl. Images: Zarouhie Abdalian, Lutz Bacher, Nairy Baghramian, Eva Barto, Patricia L. Boyd, Nina Canell & Robin Watkins, Jay DeFeo, Trisha Donnelly, Harun Farocki, Howard Fried, Jacob Kassay, Garry Neill Kennedy, Frederick Kiesler, Pope.L, Louise Lawler, Sam Lewitt, Park McArthur, Jean-Luc Moulène, Cameron Rowland, Sturtevant, Danh Vo.