Island Zombie

'Iceland was the only place I went without cause, just to be there,' the New York-based artist Roni Horn writes in Island Zombie, her attempt to explain her powerful affinity for the country. Pieced together from decades of essays, interviews, poetry and photographs, Horn's latest book is a reflection on the complex beauty of a place that she continues to return to with migratory insistence and regularity. ---Chris Allnutt, Financial Times A wonderful, beguiling read in which Roni takes us deep into her experience of Iceland. ---Ben Luke, The Art Newspaper, A Brush With . . . Island Zombie is a distillation of vignettes and essays on the natural and built environment (swimming pools are as much of a presence here as waterfalls), illustrated with the artist's photographs. Often occupying no more than half a page, these fragmentary glimpses and reflections are indeed like soil samples , archived in an elegantly uncluttered volume that evokes Iceland's forlorn emptiness as much as its places and people. ---Nancy Campbell, Times Literary Supplement Brilliant. . . . Prosaic and profound, [Island Zombie] felt like standing before art again. ---Bridget Quinn, Hyperallergic Sensually arresting . . . eloquent. . . . The first sections of the book will stoke the desire for a more in-depth study of Iceland; the others will interest veteran Iceland-watchers. * Kirkus Reviews * Island Zombie is a thoughtful reflection on isolation, resilience, natural wonder, and living in the moment. Written by the contemporary artist Roni Horn, it's the sort of book you find yourself returning to often - to ponder, to explore, and to be inspired. In fact, this book is more like an art project that you want to page through at random than a straightforward travelogue. Not only does it venture deep into the author's obsession with Iceland, but it has something unique to say about why humans love to travel in the first place. ---Steve Bramucci, UPROXX At times quiet and at times chaotic, Island Zombie captures the incorporeality of a nation that embodies the evanescence of the northern lights and the ephemerality of fumarole vapor... The book is an artistic tribute to... the diminishing nowhereness of which Iceland, indistinct in its bleak high latitudes, so definitively represents. ---Brendan Curtinrich, Split Rock Review Roni Horn's Island Zombie turns boredom into an asset...a chance to recharge and reflect. ---Jean Bundy, Anchorage Press