
Contraband
- Publisher
- Steidl / Gagosian Gallery
- Year
- 2010
- ISBN
- 9783869301341
- Specifications
- Softcover
479 pages
24.5 x 16.5 cm
English
Text by Hans Ulrich Obrist
First edition
The artist lived inside a major international airport for five days in November 2009, that airport processing more international passengers than any other in the country. This volume includes photographs taken 24 hours a day of over 1,000 items detained or seized from passengers and express mail entering the country from abroad, at both the customs and border protection inspection site and the postal service's international mail facility. Documented items include counterfeit travelers checks, overproof rum, heroin, a dead hawk, an illegal passport, purses made from endangered species, counterfeit cigars, counterfeit DVDs, gold dust, a banned stimulant plant, drugs concealed as household cleaner, counterfeit designer bags, undeclared jewelry, steroids and an ostrich egg.