Joseph Kosuth – L'Essence de la rhétorique... sigmar polke foregrounding repetition

foregrounding repetition

and abstraction

combining surreal imagery with political and philosophical undertones and translating his narrative-driven drawing practice into a carefully produced edition

weaves across the image in rhythmic

Joseph Kosuth – L'Essence de la rhétorique... sigmar polke foregrounding repetitionIn Joseph Kosuth's L'Essence de la rhtorique est dans l'allgorie IV (1998), the artist presents three decisive quotations from Michel Foucault's essay Ceci n'est pas une pipe, isolating the paired terms imiter et signifier, montrer et nommer, and regarder et lire. These phrases articulate Foucault's distinction between rhetoric and the calligram, a distinction that is central to both Ren Magritte's Surrealist practice and Kosuth's own conceptual