We Are in Open Circuits: Writings by Nam June Paik

A large illustrated volume about the most famous video artist of the century that contains almost none of the famous images — no television walls, no Buddha watching himself — and is the better for it: this is Paik thinking on paper, in four languages and a typewriter's worth of visual puns.

Edited by John G. Hanhardt, Gregory Zinman and Edith Decker-Phillips for the MIT Press series Writing Art, the 464-page book assembles long out-of-print essays such as "Global Groove and Video Common Market" with unpublished texts on Paik's partnership with the cellist Charlotte Moorman and on the role of public television, a substantial part of his compilation "Scrutable Chinese", and detailed plans for the satellite broadcasts Good Morning, Mr. Orwell (1984), Bye Bye Kipling (1986) and Wrap Around the World (1988). Nearly 150 pages reproduce Paik's original typed and handwritten sheets, with 37 colour and 116 black-and-white illustrations; much of the material comes from the Nam June Paik Archive at the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

Paik (1932–2006) trained in music history and aesthetics, wrote steadily from the late 1950s to the mid-1990s, and treated the essay, the score and the press release as continuous with the work.