Taschen organizes its private sale twice a year, which is always a smashing success. Take for example Sumo, a glossy retrospective on the work of one of the greatest photographers ever to have lived, Helmut Newton. There is no publisher quite like Taschen, who has made a habit of collecting iconic books.

This book, worth $12,500, is the second most valuable in history. Taschen continues to surprise us with the extraordinary quality of their information and unexpected design. “The greatest, heaviest, and most brilliant thing ever published in the history of civilization,” according to Der Spiegel is the book GOAT, 700 pages dedicated to boxer Mohamed Ali. From fetishism to queer art with erotic photography in between, this German publisher quickly earned its reputation by collaborating with magazines like Playboy.īut where the publisher truly sets itself apart is the publication of out-of-the-ordinary books. Going where few publishers have dared go before, Taschen soon became an essential publisher for subjects said to be “on the fringes of society”. In addition to his 11 bookstores located in the United States and Europe, TASCHEN recently opened an art gallery in Los Angeles devoted to photography.Īs you can see from the titles available on these pages, you are more than likely to have an interest in common with Benedikt Taschen - and his marvelous books give you a way to explore it fully.Founded in Cologne in 1980 by Benedikt Taschen, the eponymous publisher’s ambition is to publish illustrative and innovative books about art and fashion. The TASCHEN catalog includes scholarly examinations of cultural icons such as Muhammad Ali, gorgeous monographs on painters like Hieronymous Bosch, exquisite books of photography like Sebastião Selgado’s Genesis and portfolios of muscle cars. TASCHEN’s lavishly produced art books run the gamut from the ridiculous ( The Big Book of Breasts) to the sublime (17th-century naturalist Albertus Seba’s Cabinet of Natural Curiosities). TASCHEN’s success derives from his personality: he publishes books that reflect his own diverse personal enthusiasms. The first copy in a limited edition published in 1999 and signed by many of the celebrities whose images appear in its pages sold at auction for $364,000. Sumo, a 464-page, 66-pound compendium of Helmut Newton’s photography is one of the largest and heaviest books ever produced - it comes with its own display stand - and among the most expensive, too. From his humble beginning selling comic books in his native Cologne to his rapidly expanding book publishing empire, Benedikt Taschen has been all about living large - literally.

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