Julian Schnabel transforms life into art, finding his materials in the web of everyday life. He uses broken plates as an unlikely canvas and paints on velvet, shopping covers, military tents, theater backdrops, and boxing rings, surfaces that offer their rich history to the artist's exploration.

As a leader in the revival of painting following his immediate success with his first solo exhibition in New York in 1979, he has worked in a wide variety of mediums: he creates sculptures that translate his visual forms into space as raw, seemingly old objects, directs award-winning films depicting artists and other subtly heroic figures, and even builds his dream of a palace of Venice in New York.

“I want my life to be in my work, compressed in my painting like a crushed car. If it’s not, my work is just some things,” Schnabel has stated, and this urgency permeates his oeuvre, regardless of the mediums or means the artist chooses.

Now available in a popular edition, the complete range of Schnabel's work is depicted in unprecedented depth in this monograph from TASCHEN, created in dialogue with the artist. The texts are contributed by friends and collaborators: Laurie Anderson sketches an intimate portrait of Schnabel; in three essays by curators and art historians, Éric de Chassey examines the paintings, Bonnie Clearwater the sculptures, and Max Hollein the site-specific work; Donatien Grau writes about Palazzo Chupi, the artist’s outrageous home in New York’s West Village, while novelist Daniel Kehlmann explores his cinematic work.

This edition allows you to study the surfaces and artistic gestures and actions, offering the most generous opportunity to experience Schnabel's art outside of personal contact.