TOUT – Encyclopaedia

TOUT – Encyclopaedia is the first major book by the Lisbon-based French artist Mattia Denisse. It is co-published with Pato em Pequim with the support of the Nouveau Musée National de Monaco for the occasion of Pau Podre, an exhibition held at Rialto6, Lisbon. It contains drawings in India ink and colored pencil completed by the artist between 2020 and 2023, using an old encyclopaedia as his canvas. Denisse’s oeuvre cross-references cosmogonies, the myths of origin, surrealism, and pataphysical literature, to contemplate and provide inconclusive answers on the general meaning of life and on the “tragedy of knowledge”—a blend of apocalyptical catastrophism and anthropological idiocy. Each copy has a personalized cover wrapped in unique handmade marbled paper.