Exhibition catalogue

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An exhibition catalogue is a printed list of what is on show in an art or other exhibition. It may range in scale from a single printed sheet to a lavish hardcover "coffee-table book".

In the early 21st century, exhibitions that gather items from other institutions (museums, galleries, libraries, etc.) and that are elaborately publicized very often have catalogues in the form of substantial books.

Book-sized exhibition catalogues in the anglophone world typically have a photograph of every item on display, and perhaps also of a handful of particularly significant items that for one reason or another could not be presented. There may be a formal description of each item, and perhaps also an interpretative paragraph or two (possibly even a full page) of text for each. The resulting book will have at least one introductory essay, and very likely several essays. It is usually only in English, even if the exhibits are rather specific to a country or culture with a different language. The book may be published by the institution that hosts the exhibition (or one of these institutions), either by itself or in collaboration with a larger publisher; it may instead be published by a regular publisher. Either way, it is unlikely to dwell on the fact that it is the catalogue of a particular exhibition: visitors to the exhibition will anyway know this, while people who come across the book in a bookstore or on a website unaffiliated with the exhibition should not be led to think that the catalogue is specific to that exhibition.

In recent years, exhibition catalogues have grown to prodigious sizes and may be the most comprehensive sources for even rather large subject areas; an example of this is The History of Japanese Photography, 432 pages long and with over four hundred plates.

Japanese exhibition catalogues often provide a certain amount of text in a second language (usually English), and perhaps a smaller amount in a third language. This is not always so: the large catalogue (over 360 pages) for a major exhibition of the wood-block artist Yasunori Taninaka is in Japanese alone. Meanwhile Works by 25 Photographers in their 20s is completely bilingual, Japanese and English.

The great majority of Japanese exhibition catalogues are only available directly from the galleries or museums that host or hosted the exhibitions. These catalogues are acquired and shelved by libraries together with other books and are available on the used book market, but lack ISBNs. However, exceptions do exist: the catalogue of an exhibition of the photographs of Nakaji Yasui was produced via an independent publisher and distributed as a regular book.

[edit] Catalogues referred to

• The History of Japanese Photography, ed. Anne Wilkes Tucker, et al. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003. ISBN 0-300-09925-8 Exhibition held at the Museum of Fine Arts (Houston) and the Cleveland Museum of Art, 2003.
• Nakaji Yasui: Photographer 1903–1942 / Yasui Nakaji shashinshū (『安井仲治写真集』). Tokyo: Kyodo News, 2004. ISBN 4-7641-0542-X Exhibition held at the Nagoya City Art Museum and Shoto Museum of Art (Shibuya), 2004–5. Text in both Japanese and English.
• Taninaka Yasunori no yume: Shinema to kafe to kaiki no maboroshi (谷中安規の夢:シネマとカフェと怪奇のまぼろし, The dreams of Yasunori Taninaka: Apparitions of the cinema, cafes and mysteries). Published by the exhibitors, 2003. Exhibition held at the Shoto Museum of Art, Suzaka Hanga Museum (Suzaka) and Utsunomiya Museum of Art (Utsunomiya), 2003–2004. Text in Japanese only.
• Works by 25 Photographers in their 20s / 25nin no 20dai no shashin (25人の20代の写真). Published by the exhibitor, 1995. Exhibition held at Kiyosato Museum of Photographic Arts (Kiyosato), 1995. Text in Japanese and English.