This table highlights artists’ books in Printed Matter’s inventory that respond to themes in the exhibition Code.Excess at Tai Kwun Contemporary.

This exhibition in the Artists’ Book Library of the museum is curated by Tai Kwun’s Ingrid Pui Yee Chu and Nick Thurston from the University of Leeds (30 August 2024-1 September 2024, and then 26 September 2024–23 February 2025).

Their multi-disciplinary project—with works by Chia Amisola, Chang Yuchen, Joe Gilmore, Pablo Helguera, Lazarus Chan adorning screens, walls, and windows throughout the library—considers the creative role publishing plays as both a source and medium for artists circumventing established systems of generating, organising, and circulating knowledge. Also on view will be selections from the Artists’ Book Library’s ongoing collection of Asian artists’ books, as well as other publications which reveal the generic features of reference volumes (calendars, dictionaries, manuals), reimagine their logic systems (alphabet, digital coding, networked connections), and acknowledge the roles (archivist, editor, translator) of those who collect, maintain, and circulate their contents. There will also be public programmes which consider how the seemingly established formats and ways we learn and share continue to evolve.