Torrington Project is an artist book by Tom Burr documenting his three-year occupation of a repurposed 19th-century factory in Torrington, Connecticut. A subversive take on the catalogue raisonné, it blurs the boundaries between studio and gallery, art and architecture, and artist and community. Through extensive photographic documentation, critical essays, and personal reflections, it maps both the physical transformation of the space and the network of social exchanges that emerged within it. The publication functions not as a static record but as an active extension of the Torrington Project itself—a site where past works, new interventions, and evolving ideas continue to circulate and unfold beyond their original context.

From 2021 to 2024, Burr took up residence in a sprawling, former manufacturing facility. Neither a conventional exhibition nor a traditional studio, the project transformed the building into what Burr has called a “living archive”—a space for revisiting, recontextualizing, and, in some cases, restoring past works. Rather than a site of pure production, Burr brought together over ninety works from throughout his career, collapsing the divide between past and present. Burr also opened the space to fellow artists, inviting Gordon Hall, Maria Hassabi, and Nick Mauss to stage performances, while welcoming an evolving network of visitors as Torrington Project unfolded. The project explored the fluid interplay between an artwork’s conception, reception, and historicization, with Burr reflecting on how his work has shifted over time—an investigation now deployed through the form of this book.

Alongside writing from George Baker, Jordan Carter, Aria Dean, Jody Graf, Renée Green, David Joselit, Christine Messineo, Humberto Moro, Blake Oetting, as well as Burr’s recollections, the publication also features extensive documentation and archival ephemera. Torrington Project charts the social and spatial dimensions that defined the titular endeavor, underscoring Burr’s ongoing engagement with architecture, institutional critique, personal histories, and the transformation of public space.

Tom Burr is a conceptual artist whose work examines the entanglements of architecture, identity, and public space. A graduate of the Whitney Independent Study Program, Burr emerged through the influential gallery American Fine Arts, Co., aligning with a generation of artists who reimagined the strategies of institutional critique and minimalism in response to the shifting political and social dynamics of late twentieth century New York City. Burr’s work has been featured in major exhibitions including Sonsbeek 93 in Arnhem, Question the Wall Itself at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, the 2004 Whitney Biennial, and Skulptur Projekte Münster, among others. His extra-institutional projects include Body/Building, a year-long residency in the Marcel Breuer-designed Pirelli Tire Building in his hometown of New Haven, Connecticut. In addition to his artistic practice, Burr is a prolific writer. His collected texts were published in Anthology: Writings 1991–2015. He lives and works between New York and Connecticut.

8.25 x 11.5 inches
Paperback
Fall 2025
ISBN: 9798991036740

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Editor: Blake Oetting
Managing Editors: James Hoff and Sam Korman
Designer: Garrick Gott
Copy Editor: Allison Dubinsky