Daniela Comani

In 1990, Daniela Comani started to become interested in the format of the artist book, making her first, one-piece book-object. In the following years she produced several artist books as one-off pieces or with small print runs, both with photos and/or drawings. In 2001 she began to publish artist books in offset, collaborating with several publishers such as Revolver, Corraini, Patrick Frey, Archive Books, Humboldt Books, Monroe Books, and Danilo Montanari, among others. The artist book often becomes an element within her installations.

Daniela Comani was born in Bologna, Italy; she lives and works in Berlin since 1989. Her multimedia installations engage in a dialogue about history, identity, gender, and language. Recent solo exhibitions include YOU ARE MINE, Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea, Rome, 2022; Planet Earth: 21st Century, Museum Folkwang, Essen, 2023; Kunstverein am Rosa Luxemburg Platz, Berlin, Fall 2024

Daniela Comani, Planet Earth: 21st Century, Humboldt Books, 2019 © Daniela Comani

soft cover, 14,8 x 10,5 cm, 768 pages, 360 photos, German, English, and Italian.

For Planet Earth: 21st Century I sourced visual material from Apple Maps (a 3D software originally developed by Saab-Military Industries) and Google Earth Virtual Reality. Between 2015 and 2019 I “flew” through virtual city views and made my own pictures, turning those screenshots into 360 black and white postcards. The images show streets, architecture, and monuments from around the world. Re-enacting geography in the era of the Anthropocene, the focal point of this project was the interaction between human perception of the planet, urban landscapes, and technology.
The installation included an artist book, like a pocket atlas.

[+]

Daniela Comani, Orlando’s Library, Danilo Montanari Editore, 2022 © Daniela Comani

Board book, 10 pages, 10 color photos, 31.5 x 16 x 1.4 cm. Edition of 50 + xx AP, numbered and signed

"Orlando’s Library" is a large-scale, site-specific installation (dimensions variable) based on the photo series "New Publications edited by Daniela Comani", where I manipulated titles of classic novels, changing the gender of the protagonist on the covers.
For the installation, I photographed bookshelves and digitally placed 202 manipulated covers (in different languages and editions) on the shelves in a kind of trompe-l’oeil. The bookshelves are printed on wallpaper and applied directly to the wall, giving the illusion of depth and space and adding to a hyper realistic effect.

[+]

Ota-Binding brochure, 256 pages
28.2 x 19 cm
English, Italian, German
La Galleria Nazionale, Rome
Danilo Montanari Editore, Ravenna
ISBN 9791280750150

The publication "A-Z" showcases Daniela Comani's multidisciplinary works spanning 20 years of artistic research. Comani's pieces often explore the intersection of history, identity, and gender, as well as queer and feminist themes, often within a narrative structure. Using 'gendering' as an artistic strategy, Comani challenges stereotypes, history, identity, and the interpretation of language.

[+]

Daniela Comani

Book Signing Sessions