A Sumo Wrestler of a Book – How Marlene Taschen Continues Her Father’s Art Book Publishing Company

The golden lettering is embossed three-dimensionally on the black cover, and the pages can only be turned with white gloves. A woman tries to lift "Baby Sumo" anyway, but fails and quickly lets the baking-tray-sized book slide back into the stand. The new Salvador Dalí volume from Taschen weighs 16 kilograms.

The genius would certainly have enjoyed the festive gathering at the old "Monastery of the Angels" in Barcelona at the beginning of June. Taschen constantly presents books, occasionally XL versions, but this giant baby is special because it was Dalí about whom Benedikt Taschen published his first self-produced art book.

The Cologne-based publishing house is celebrating its 45th anniversary this year, yet it's not founder Benedikt Taschen who's on the small stage, but his daughter Marlene Taschen. She gives a short speech, saying that this is a full circle. Not yet forty, she's already co-managing director, and has been for over eight years. One could mistake her for "the daughter of" who will inevitably take over the business. After all, even as a baby, she modeled in advertisements with the words: "I don't want a paperback, I want a book from Taschen!"

"I guess that's what you call fate," says Marlene Taschen about this early, and in retrospect, groundbreaking commitment to the publishing house. Neither she nor her father expected her to join the company so soon. The rebellious teenager left home at 16, lived for a time in Australia and Panama after graduating from high school, and studied at the London School of Economics. She then worked as a project manager for the Museum of Everything.

But when her first daughter was born 13 years ago, she thought, "If we get along so well, why wait? Why shouldn't I devote my energy to the family business now?" So she called her father in Los Angeles, who was pleased with the unexpected offer, let her do it for a while, and then, in typical Benedikt Taschen fashion, didn't hesitate for long.

In the middle of a newspaper interview, without prior consultation with her, he announced that his daughter would soon be appointed managing director and responsible for all operational business. "That was a shock at first," Marlene Taschen recalls, "but it was difficult to discuss things at that moment." The matter had long since been made public anyway.

She can't have done a bad job so far. According to her own statements and industry estimates, the publisher's revenue has grown significantly again in recent years. "The book industry likes to complain," says Taschen, "but it's actually a very solid business." At least when you're selling elaborately produced, tactile art books that would never work as e-books.

In her absence, Benedikt Taschen appointed his daughter Marlene Taschen as managing director. Even as a baby, she modeled for the publishing house's advertisements.

Taschen is even benefiting somewhat from digitalization and the associated longing for "old" media. Recently, the hashtag #bookshelfwealth trended on social media. People photographed or filmed themselves in front of their beautifully arranged bookshelves. Celebrities like Gwyneth Paltrow commission curators to stock their libraries with both exquisite and striking displays. Naturally, the actress also has a Sumo edition of Taschen in her collection, "Genesis" by the recently deceased photographer Sebastião Salgado.

Marlene Taschen attended the funeral in Paris. She realized one of her first projects with him and his wife, but they had known each other for as long as she can remember. "My father doesn't separate work and life," says Taschen. At home in Cologne, the layouts were spread out on the kitchen table, and the three children from his first marriage were occasionally consulted. People like June and Helmut Newton, Jeff Koons and Cicciolina, and Karl Lagerfeld came to visit.

Benedikt Taschen began selling comics as a teenager. The now 64-year-old's truly brilliant idea, however, was to pare down the art, which was still quite pretentious in the 1980s, and squeeze it between two affordable book covers. "Art for everyone" was his motto, and the books from the "Basic Art" series, which cost between 15 and 25 euros, are still his main business.

Sensational editions like the Helmut Newton Sumo, the largest and, at $15,000, most expensive book of the 20th century, are primarily good for the image, but even these prestige projects are later remarketed in various editions for all target groups and budgets. "My father did all that pretty well," says Taschen. "I don't have to reinvent anything here."

The publisher says she's certainly set things in motion. Online sales are expected to have increased by 20 percent in 2024 alone. Her father likes to flirt with the idea of ​​publishing primarily what he himself enjoys. His daughter may not have the same passion for specific artists, but she thinks more analytically and soberly. Taschen knows, by looking at the numbers, which topics are of interest. A children's book with illustrations from Disney classics has just been published, and the program now also includes books about lemons and mushrooms.

"She can do everything I can," her father raved in that revealing interview. The industry was a complicated, anachronistic business, he said, "but Marlene has all the skills needed, even more than I do. Plus, she looks better." In the past, the tall, slim woman with full lips would probably have been called a "distinctive presence."

In photos, she confidently presents herself with her father, and with artists such as David Bailey and David Hockney. In Barcelona, ​​she wears her dark hair loosely tied back and a red patterned dress made of sturdy fabric that blends perfectly with the backdrop of the old monastery.

She doesn't give the most inspired speech that evening, but she's all the more open and relaxed in her interactions with the guests later on. Although she lived in London for a long time and now lives in Milan with her husband and two children, her German is still permeated by that Rhenish sing-song accent.

Taschen Publishing is often accused of a predictable and popular program, designed for everyone. It celebrates the same great artists, photographers, and designers, who are either dead or close to retirement. The publisher disagrees, pointing to "this fantastic Lemon Book." Also appearing at Art Basel is a collaboration with the artist André Butzer: a collection of Hölderlin poems illustrated by Butzer. "We're also working on a volume with the young painter Grace Weaver."

But yes, Marlene Taschen admits, there is unfortunately not much supply of great geniuses, and the problem with her books is and remains the same: "In the end, we have to fill several hundred truly beautiful pages."