One million years
By: On Kawara
Publisher: Editions Micheline Szwajcer & Michèle Didier
Published: 1999
Place of publication: Brussels
Language: eng
Number of pages: 2001
ISBN-13: 9782930256023
Copyright date: 1999
Subjects: Time in art; Numbers in art
Other titles: Past; Future
Description: An artist's book by conceptual artist On Kawara exemplifies his preoccupation with the passing and marking of time, a topic at the core of the artist's practice. The first volume, “Past (998,031 BC to 1969 AD)," begins with the phrase, “For all those who have lived and died.” The second volume, “Future (1993 AD to 1,001,992 AD)," commences with “For the last one.” Both then proceed at a rate of 500 years a page. Each page is carefully laid out so that the years on subsequent pages line up exactly and are not visible through the translucent 32g Bible Veritable Ivory paper. In these books, the length of an average human life is equivalent to a few lines, and the whole of human history reduced to a few pages.
Notes: "Limited edition of 570 numbered copies. The copies with the numbers 1-60 are signed, the copies with the numbers 561-570 are A.P."--Colophon.

Except for the first and last pages in each volume, each numbered page contains 500 consecutive year dates, from 998031 BC to 1969 AD (v. [1]) and from 1993 AD to 1001992 AD (v. [2]). These dates comprise the entire text.

"Printed on 32g Bible Veritable Ivory paper"--Technical file on publisher's website, retrieved Feb. 28, 2012.

"Typesetting by Delight, Brussels, Belgium. Printed and bound by Jongbloed, Heerenveen, the Netherlands"--Colophon.

Library owns copy 305
Table of contents: title: [1].; title: For all those who have lived and died -- -- [2].; title: For the last one.