The Space of Words: From Mallarmé to Broodthaers

The Space of Words: From Mallarmé to Broodthaers brings together the text of a talk given by philosopher Jacques Rancière during the Marcel Broodthaers exhibition held at the Nantes Museum of Fine Arts in 2004. The book is a short but extremely dense essay focusing on the fundamental issues of modern art and aesthetic thought.

Rancière centers his discussion on Marcel Broodthaers’ work, which references Mallarmé’s poem A Throw of the Dice Will Never Abolish Chance. In Broodthaers’ work, the words of the poem are blacked out with lines, transforming the text into a visual plane. This gesture, according to Rancière, creates both a homage to Mallarmé and a powerful paradox.

The Space of Words not only interprets Broodthaers’ work but also invites a reconsideration of 20th-century modernism through the nature of modern art, the relationship between aesthetics and politics, and the concept of the “reification” of writing. It is an essential reference text for readers interested in the connections between art, text, and commodification.