Kaleidoscopic Eye is an artist book published as part of the exhibition Kaleidoscopic Eye by Mariana Castillo Deball, which took place from February 14 - April 12, 2009 at Kunst Halle Sankt Gallen in Switzerland. The book includes glossy, full color photographs as well as texts by Mariano Castillo Deball and Dario Gamboni.
In this publication, Mariana Castillo Deball combines written essays, short stories, and images in an excavation of subjectivity, authorship, and history. The kaleidoscope serves as a metaphorical lens in which a viewer’s gaze is returned, fragmented, and augmented in a similar way that cultural artifacts are pieced together as a reflection of a particular historical narrative. By pushing on these archival processes, Castillo Deball reveals the slipperiness of truth and history. Kunst Halle Sankt Gallen writes “Castillo Deball’s mode of work has been based on kaleidoscopic approach towards language: Different disciplines and ways to describe the world can clash and thereby generate a polyphonic voice.” This irreverent, playful form of institutional critique is captured in this limited edition publication published by Bom Dia Books.
Bom Dia Books is an independent publisher based in Berlin, founded by Manuel Raeder and Manuel Goller in 2011. Bom Dia Books focuses on publishing work by contemporary Latin American Artists in high quality artist books.
Mariana Castillo Deball is an artist from Mexico City who researches institutions who have collections, classifications, and catalogues such as libraries, museums, and archives with a symbolic representation of the world. She then edits, and specifically selects information, objects, and documentation to reconstruct a new classification with a new implied narrative. This research process often manifests in site-specific installations, video works, or in the case of Kaleidoscopic Eye, a publication.