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I have no time

Photo: Adam Sakovy
Photo: Adam Sakovy
Photo: Adam Sakovy
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    • I have no time
    • Ich habe keine Zeit
  • 1983
  • book, hardcover
  • 17,4 × 12,5 cm
In 1979, after having produced more than 50 different books that he had multiplied by hand, Mladen Stilinović issued his first printed book “I Have No Time” in Croatian. It was later re-issued in Tübingen in 1983 in Croatian, English, and German. In the dense texture of the work one and the same sentence is repeated: “I have no time.” At the beginning is the author’s instruction: “I wrote this book when I had no time. I would ask the readers to read it when they have no time.” The work is serious and ironical, only speciously comical. “I have no time” is everywhere today the most commonly uttered phrase, with which we justify not having done the things that we should have done or would like to have done. Most people who took the book into their hand at once understood the message. But the book should be read to the end. When repeated, the phrases have the ring; as the artist said, “of a prayer of today.” B.S.