Since 1966, Swiss painter Niele Toroni (born 1937) has applied paint imprints of a number 50 brush at regular intervals of 12 inches, irreverently challenging accepted notions of authorship and gently mocking the figure of the artist. The first-ever English-language publication about this pioneering artist illuminates his humble attempts to liberate painting from its own representation by documenting his groundbreaking exhibition at Swiss Institute in New York. An essay by Joachim Pissarro and Annie Wischmeyer attempts to reveal the implications of Toroni's metonymic interventions, while letters from the artist reveal his own thinking about his practice and its place in art history.

Embracing the conceptual framework of an exhibition at Swiss Institute and its related public programs, each book in the Swiss Institute series adds retrospective context through seminal essays, archival materials, event transcripts, artist portfolios and exhibition documentation.