ASSAB ONE 2002 – 2022

ASSAB ONE 2002–2022

Map, archive and sentimental chronology of the first twenty years of Assab One

16x22 cm
Softcover
528 colour pages
First edition of 500
ISBN 978-8894439724

PRICE
40€

ASSAB ONE 2002-2022

This book collects, in five hundred and twenty-eight pages, the first twenty years of Assab One activity in the form of a narrative in images: exhibitions, behind-the-scenes, shared moments and voices of artists and people who have passed through and felt at home.

This informal narrative is accompanied by a timeline of exhibitions, credits and the names of all the people who, in various capacities, have participated in this unique collective history.

“You’ve got to keep it hopping! It mustn’t stand still!!!”

You’ve got to keep it hopping! It mustn’t stand still!!!” said Marisa Merz, whenever she saw the Roland Ultra RVU7, the four-color printing press that arrived at GEA in 1969, and remained in place for many years, in one of the spaces of Assab One, after the decommissioning of the facility. 

Marisa got her wish: we really did keep that machine busy! In 2012, after having been the genius loci of Assab One for ten years, and a set for many performances – such as the memorable event orchestrated by Luca Pancrazzi and Steve Piccolo in 2002 – after having been played, climbed and immortalized, as well as giving its name to a literary festival, the old Roland was taken all the way to India where it began a new life in a printshop, making very colorful cardboard boxes for exotic fruit.

The journey of Roland Ultra, which began in the winter of 2011 with the disassembly of the press, witnessed by many friends who came to say farewell, concluded with a joyful printing ceremony in India in 2012, and a large exhibition in Milan in 2013.

This is but one of the chapters in the history of the first 20 years of Assab One, none of which were programmed, foreseen or planned in great detail.

All these chapters have been the result of a natural process, involving many different parts: the building that hosts us, the vestiges of the labor of the workers, the generosity and brilliance of the artists who have contributed to reformulate the spaces with their presence and their works, the voices and gestures of the many people who have spent time here, curators, volunteers, interns, framers, carpenters and masons, wall painters, with whom we have set up exhibitions; architect friends with whom we have considered many things, including the recent, delicate alterations that have made it possible to offer spaces for other initiatives, including Studio Mumbai, Formafantasma and Threes Productions.

“Be careful – with memory you can write War and Peace, but also a second-grade book report,” Ettore Sottsass warned us 20 years ago, when I was searching for the words to translate very confused thoughts about how I imagined the future of that industrial building in disuse, in the hope of giving it a form that would be compatible with its past, in an epoch when people still didn’t venture into the outskirts to see art in Milan.

Those confused thoughts never did produce the strategic, entrepreneurial project with which I was trying to come to grips at the time. But they have given rise to an invaluable experience full of shared emotions and surprises.

At Assab One everything has happened spontaneously, through chance encounters, stumbling blocks, random circumstances, and due to a sort of obstinate will to remain in a neutral, open, free, maybe even “amateur-ish” zone, in the positive sense of the term. A zone that is a bit “freakatone” (hippie), as Johanna Grawunder calls it in her contribution, anglicizing an adjective from Italian slang to capture the idea…

ASSAB ONE 2002–2022 book – neither an elementary school report nor a historical novel – narrates what has happened so far, more or less along these lines: through images that speak for themselves, especially behind the scenes, and voices of people who have passed this way and felt at home.

For readers who want to get their bearings, in an orderly passage through these 20 years, the book offers a timeline of the exhibitions, while the last pages list the names of all the people who have taken part in this irreplicable collective history.

Elena Quarestani

Purchase the book

Please fill in your personal information, book shipping information and credit card details here. The transaction takes place directly on the Assab website and is handled through Stripe, a platform with very high security standards.
We ship to Italy and also abroad, without limitations: delivery times vary between 5 and 15 working days.




    Practical information

    Security

    The credit card transaction takes place directly on the Assab One website and is handled through Stripe, a platform with very high security standards.

    If you have any questions, please write to info@assab-one.org or contact us at the following telephone numbers:
    phone 02 2828546
    mob +39 348 2925085

    Shipping and pickup on site

    You can choose to receive the book at home or pick it up at Assab One.
    If you chose the shipping option, the delivery time varies between 5 and 15 business days.

    If you chose onsite pickup, you can come by and pick up your purchase from us during the following hours: Wednesdays to Fridays from 3 pm to 7 pm.
    Our address is:
    Ex stabilimento GEA
    via Privata Assab, 1 20132 Milano

    If you have any questions, please write to info@assab-one.org or contact us at the following telephone numbers:
    phone 02 2828546
    mob +39 348 2925085