Inserate/Advertisements 1971/1972

Actionist, maker of objects, writer and graphic artist Dieter Roth created an exceptionally diverse and convoluted oeuvre. In Lucerne he published a series of small ads twice weekly in the newspaper Anzeiger Stadt Luzern und Umgebung, consisting of an aphorism and signed by his initials. Embedded in advertisements from real life, these ads conjured the surreal, subversive side of existence as in statements like “A good beginning is an evil end”, “A tear is as evil as a good word” and “Two tears are better than five stones”. The paper’s bourgeois readers raised such a protest over the disturbance of their peace by such enigmatic profundity that the paper felt compelled to terminate publication after 248 ads. From 1973 to 1979, Roth published his statements in artist’s books, titled The Sea of Tears (with the original pages of the newspaper) and Sea of Tears 1–5. This is the first complete, chronological publication of the ads, along with an English translation.