Art Basel Qatar 2026: Matt Mullican. New Edinburgh Encyclopedia, 1825 (1991)

We are pleased to announce our participation in Art Basel Qatar, from 5 – 7 February. Our booth is dedicated to a solo presentation of Matt Mullican.

Matt Mullican’s work explores systems of knowledge, meaning, language, and signification, as well as the relationship between perception and reality—the ability to see and to represent. This focus underlies his fascination with encyclopedic models and his use of the Edinburgh Encyclopædia from 1825 as the basis for his work New Edinburgh Encyclopedia, 1825 (1991).

Drawing from a publication that took 22 years to complete, the art work reflects humanity’s drive to develop, categorize, and comprehend knowledge. Comprised of 446 large magnesium printing plates and the same number of rubbings on paper in approximately the same size, this project is one of the most important achievements in the artist’s oeuvre.

At Art Basel Qatar 2026, Galerie Thomas Schulte presents a condensed installation that mainly draws from the body of printing plates that form the essence of this impressive work. They carry the encyclopedia’s illustrations in alphabetical order. Arranged on a pedestal and on narrow shelves in rows, they establish a clear organizing principle. Within it appear illustrations, plans, and diagrams on engineering, architecture, anatomy, horticulture, and other fields, forming a condensed portrait of early 19th‑century understanding.

The relief printing plates serve as a point of origin from which reproductions can endlessly emerge. Mullican has used them to create an edition of rubbings that evokes the blurred and shifting nature of human comprehension.

Published between 1808 and 1830, during the Scottish Enlightenment’s publishing boom, the Edinburgh Encyclopædia positioned the city as a rival to Paris and London. The long gap between its first and eighteenth volumes mirrors the rapid evolution of meaning over time. Mullican’s New Edinburgh Encyclopedia, 1825 traces the continuity of images across centuries—from their creation to their reproductions, transformations, and the frameworks they sustain.