Pop reloaded

Michel Majerus

When Burkhard Riemschneider of neugerriemschneider asked us if we’d like to finish the catalogue of Michel Majerus it was not an easy yes for us. Of course we wanted to do the book. But Michel had just died a couple of months ago in a plane crash, and as if this wasn’t bad enough, he had started the design of the book by himself already. This meant that we had actually had to work on the original files of Michels’. What a nightmare that was to agree to finish what he had started. The first time we opened the QuarkXPress file it really felt extremely odd. A quite intimate moment – we felt like intruders. Apart from this it was a delight to go through his paintings and texts that came with this. The email conversations on the book case, hidden behind the dustcover that folded out to a double sided poster, were hilarious as were many of the paintings and prints in the book. He always knew how not to tell a joke by pointing in numerous directions to divert you into the dark .... and just by looking over your shoulder it became clear what he was aiming at.