Jeremy Shaw

This self-titled monograph is the first survey publication on Jeremy Shaw, the Canadian artist whose film, video, sculpture and performance work examines altered states and the belief systems, subcultures and pseudo-sciences built around the search for transcendence.

Co-published by the Centre Pompidou and the Swiss Institute in 2020 to accompany Shaw's exhibitions at the two institutions, the 142-page hardback surveys the video installations, photographic works and sculpture through which he stages dance, ritual and belief as forms of altered consciousness, often shot in a mock-documentary or scientific-instructional register that treats its subjects with a straight face. Essays by Christine Macel and Simon Castets, the exhibitions' co-curators, are joined by contributions from Nora M. Khan, Laura McLean-Ferris and Monika Szewczyk. Together they situate the work within recent thinking on neuroscience, spirituality and media.

Shaw (b. 1977, North Vancouver) is based in Berlin and has had solo exhibitions at the Centre Pompidou, MoMA PS1, the Schinkel Pavillon and the Julia Stoschek Foundation. He has also shown in the Venice Biennale and Manifesta 11, and won the Sobey Art Award in 2016. His work is held by MoMA, Tate Modern, the Centre Pompidou and the National Gallery of Canada.