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"Grapefruit's readers are intrinsic to the realization
of the artworks; since they are inestimable, the book's potential is inestimable. Each
instruction is labeled with the date Ono thought of the work. This signifies a
starting point for each piece, a moment at which the art work entered the world.
… The activity will not end as long as the book exists somewhere. The works
themselves happen beyond the book. Conceivably, even when the book is gone, the
art would exist mentally until the last reader-artist of the last copy died. The
idea art spawned by the book obviously possesses very different qualities than
the corporeal, arranged physicality of the book. The codex provides structure
for the instructions to exist within. As such, the book is not only the "temporal
qualities and spatial characteristics" of these instructions, but also the
very system that assimilates them into the lives and shelves of people the world
throughout. Though the book is a relevant component of the
artwork, the idea art is only initially dependent on its physicality. Once an
idea artwork has been visualized, it can exist perpetually, immeasurably, and
beyond the book. …The book is an artifact. Her book
belongs to a trend among many book artists' to oppose the art establishment in
the same way that performance art and other non-traditional mediums of the twentieth
century act: by seeking to expand the system of art. This broadening includes
questioning what it means to experience art, what art should look like, who should
make art, what function art should serve, who should view art, etc., in other
words, challenging the premises and foundations of the art world. In one small
book, Ono plays within all of these paradigms, exposing the limitations of the
art world. It is an active artists' book, meant to be carried
around the world, read in random order, experienced over a lifetime, perhaps repeatedly;
in groups, or perhaps alone. The point of Grapefruit is not how you do it; it
is that you do it."
Full-Color
Hardcover
Black
& White Hardcover
 Yoko
Ono's book Grapefruit
Yoko
Ono's instruction pieces
Joan
E. Stoltman's full thesis "Engage, Perform, Act: How Contemporary Artists
Use the Book as Form and the Book as Idea"
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grapefruit
as an idea
