Six Years

The bestselling author and creator of the hit Netflix drama The Stranger explores the dangers of obsession in this #1 New York Times bestselling masterpiece of modern suspense. Six years have passed since Jake Fisher watched Natalie, the love of his life, marry another man. Six years of hiding a broken heart by throwing himself into his career as a college professor. Six years of keeping his promise to leave Natalie alone, and six years of tortured dreams of her life with her new husband, Todd. But six years haven’t come close to extinguishing his feelings, and when Jake comes across Todd’s obituary, he can’t keep himself away from the funeral. There he gets the glimpse of Todd’s wife he’s hoping for...but she is not Natalie. As Jake searches for the truth, his picture-perfect memories of Natalie begin to unravel. Mutual friends of the couple either can’t be found, or don’t remember Jake. No one has seen Natalie in years. And soon, Jake’s search for the woman who broke his heart puts his very life at risk as he uncovers the secrets and lies that love can hide....

Lucy R. Lippard's famous book, itself resembling an exhibition, is now brought full circle in an exhibition (and catalog) resembling her book. “Conceptual art, for me, means work in which the idea is paramount and the material form is secondary, lightweight, ephemeral, cheap, unpretentious and/or 'dematerialized.'” —Lucy R. Lippard, Six Years In 1973 the critic and curator Lucy R. Lippard published Six Years, a book with possibly the longest subtitle in the bibliography of art: The dematerialization of the art object from 1966 to 1972: a cross-reference book of information on some esthetic boundaries: consisting of a bibliography into which are inserted a fragmented text, art works, documents, interviews, and symposia, arranged chronologically and focused on so-called conceptual or information or idea art with mentions of such vaguely designated areas as minimal, anti-form, systems, earth, or process art, occurring now in the Americas, Europe, England, Australia, and Asia (with occasional political overtones) edited and annotated by Lucy R. Lippard. Six Years, sometimes referred to as a conceptual art object itself, not only described and embodied the new type of art-making that Lippard was intent on identifying and cataloging, it also exemplified a new way of criticizing and curating art. Nearly forty years later, the Brooklyn Museum takes Lippard's celebrated experiment in curated concatenation as a template, turning a book that resembled an exhibition into an exhibition materializing the ideas in her book. The artworks and essays featured in this publication recall the thrill that was tangible in Lippard's original documentation, reminding us that during the late sixties and early seventies all possible social and material parameters of art (making) were played with, worked over, inverted, reduced, expanded, and rejected. By tracing Lippard's own activities in those years, the book also documents the early blurring of boundaries among critical, curatorial, and artistic practices. With more than 200 images of work by dozens of artists (printed in color throughout), this book brings Lippard's curatorial experiment full circle.

In Six Years Lucy R. Lippard documents the chaotic network of ideas that has been labeled conceptual art. The book is arranged as an annotated chronology into which is woven a rich collection of original documents—including texts by and taped discussions among and with the artists involved and by Lippard, who has also provided a new preface for this edition. The result is a book with the character of a lively contemporary forum that offers an invaluable record of the thinking of the artists—a historical survey and essential reference book for the period.

Part One: SIX YEARS OF DARKNESS Refugees from the Nazis, seventeen-year-old Joni Morgen and her mother arrive in blacked out London in November 1939, after an eight-months stint as domestic servants at a seaside resort. Standing on the wet pavement outside Victoria Station, Joni takes one look at the hustle and bustle of the busy street and is immediately sucked into the spirit of this great city. There is no other place where she wants to be at this time in history. She remains in London through air raids, destruction, shortages, financial stresses and twelve hour work days. Finally the war was over. With youthful optimism she writes: "Peace! Peace on Earth! No man, woman or child will ever be killed again, no bomb dropped, no torpedo fired. World peace. How long mankind longed for that. Now itOs real." Part Two: THIS NEW LIFE Seven years after the war, Britain is still trying to recover from its devastation. Disillusioned, tired of unending rationing, bomb-damaged buildings, shortages and personal restrictions, Joni and her friend Gerda, both alone in the world immigrate to Canada. An unexpectedly carefree and exciting new life opens up for thirty-year-old Joni, a striking contrast to the severity of the war years. The personal nature of these stories allows the reader to walk in the shoes of an "enemy alien" during the war, and an adventurous young woman seeking a purpose in life after the war.