Making the Floating Piers
Christo’s personal project book of his work on Lago d’Iseo
From June 18 to July 3, 2016, 100 kilometers east of Milan and 200 kilometers west of Venice,
The Floating Piers by
Christo and Jeanne-Claude allowed
1.2 million people to walk on water. The project, comprising 100,000 square meters of shimmering dahlia yellow fabric above a modular floating dock system of 220,000 high-density polyethylene cubes created a
three-kilometer walkway across the surface of Lake Iseo, connecting the mainland to the islands of Monte Isola and San Paolo.
“It is all about walking,” said Christo of the project. “Including the stretches on the land, you have to walk five kilometers to appreciate the project,
the constantly changing views, the lake, the mountains, the other visitors. All these things together are the final artwork.” The experience was as tactile as it was visual, a multisensory wonder of undulating fabric, shimmering yellow, and ever-shifting light upon the water.
In this
Collector’s Edition (No. 161–1,000), signed and designed by Christo himself, the artist presents this extraordinary environmental work from start to finish. On
846 pages, he reveals the couple’s earliest concept of a floating surface on tranquil waters back in 1970 through renewed interest in the project, research into possible locations, technical developments, material production, and the
final 16-day experience with enraptured visitors from around the world. To round off this unique project book and privileged insight into Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s practice, the volume includes a
swatch of the project’s original dahlia yellow fabric.
Limited Collector's Edition of 840 copies signed by Christo and Wolfgang Volz, each with a 24 x 24 cm swatch of The Floating Piers’ original dahlia yellow fabric.
Also available as four different Limited Art Editions, each with a separate project book signed by Christo and Wolfgang Volz.
The artist
Christo and Jeanne-Claude began their collaboration in 1961, and lived in New York City since 1964. Jeanne-Claude died in 2009; Christo died in 2020. Their large-scale projects include Wrapped Coast, Australia, 1968–69; Valley Curtain, Rifle, Colorado, 1970–72; Running Fence, Sonoma and Marin Counties, California, 1972–76; Surrounded Islands, Biscayne Bay, Florida, 1980–83; The Pont Neuf Wrapped, Paris, 1975–85; The Umbrellas, Japan–USA, 1984–91; Wrapped Reichstag, Berlin, 1971–95; Wrapped Trees, Riehen, Switzerland, 1997–98; The Gates, Central Park, New York City, 1979–2005; The Floating Piers, Lake Iseo, Italy, 2014–16 and The London Mastaba, Serpentine Lake, Hyde Park, 2016–18. Christo and Jeanne-Claude's temporary work of art L'Arc de Triomphe, Wrapped, Project for Paris is scheduled for September 18–October 3, 2021.
The photographer
Wolfgang Volz has worked with Christo and Jeanne-Claude as the exclusive photographer of their works since 1971. He was also project director (with Roland Specker) for Wrapped Reichstag, Berlin, 1971–95 and (with Josy Kraft) for Wrapped Trees, Riehen, Switzerland, 1997–98, and was in charge of The Wall – 13,000 Oil Barrels, Gasometer Oberhausen, Germany, 1998–99 and Big Air Package, Gasometer Oberhausen, Germany, 2010–13. His close collaboration has resulted in many books and more than 300 exhibitions in museums and galleries around the world.
The contributing author
Germano Celant, renowned art historian and theoretician, author and curator, is internationally acknowledged for his theories on Arte Povera. He is the Artistic and Scientific Superintendent of Fondazione Prada, as well as the Curator of Fondazione Aldo Rossi, Milan, and Fondazione Emilio e Annabianca Vedova, Venice. In 2016, he was the Project Director of Christo and Jeanne-Claude's The Floating Piers, at Lago d’Iseo, Italy.
The author
Adam Blackbourn has been a member of Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s working family since 2006. In addition to his work as an artist and writer, he and his partner Ruei Ji run the Chinese-to-English translation studio Bacon Translations. He has collaborated on numerous publications about Christo and Jeanne-Claude.
Christo and Jeanne-Claude. The Floating Piers
Edition of 840
Hardcover in slipcase with piece of fabric and six fold-out pages, 11.4 x 10.6 in., 14.40 lb, 846 pages
ISBN 978-3-8365-4787-1
Multilingual Edition: English, Italian
