On Seeing Only Totally New Things
Gavin Murphy

Gavin Murphy’s ‘On Seeing Only Totally New Things’ is a gorgeous book with the IMCO complex at its core. Within, there are a series of texts by other contributors as well as documentation of three of Murphy’s recent exhibitions (including the film ‘Something New Under the Sun’, bringing Bernard and IMCO to Eva International and the RHA in 2012), a book-within-a-book in which Murphy examines Bernard’s career, and a collection of ephemera, artifacts, and photographed texts around the subject. There’s a very successful breadth to the project, speaking at once to Murphy’s judgment, ambition, and detective work, and also to the value of a building’s story being approached by someone whose practice is not pure architecture or architectural history. It feels like an expanded archive, driven by both personal and intellectual curiosity, and it’s genuinely exciting for a reader to be presented with the outcome.

Gavin Murphy is a Dublin-based artist and curator with a long engagement with artist-led projects and collaborative initiatives. He is currently a director/curator of the artist-run space, Pallas Projects/Studios. ¹