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Books > Arts & Architecture > The arts: general issues > Theory of art
A pioneering artist continues his visionary inquiry into hyperspace
In this insightful book, which is a revisionist math history as
well as a revisionist art history, Tony Robbin, well known for his
innovative computer visualizations of hyperspace, investigates
different models of the fourth dimension and how these are applied
in art and physics. Robbin explores the distinction between the
slicing, or Flatland, model and the projection, or shadow, model.
He compares the history of these two models and their uses and
misuses in popular discussions. Robbin breaks new ground with his
original argument that Picasso used the projection model to invent
cubism, and that Minkowski had four-dimensional projective geometry
in mind when he structured special relativity. The discussion is
brought to the present with an exposition of the projection model
in the most creative ideas about space in contemporary mathematics
such as twisters, quasicrystals, and quantum topology. Robbin
clarifies these esoteric concepts with understandable drawings and
diagrams. Robbin proposes that the powerful role of projective
geometry in the development of current mathematical ideas has been
long overlooked and that our attachment to the slicing model is
essentially a conceptual block that hinders progress in
understanding contemporary models of spacetime. He offers a
fascinating review of how projective ideas are the source of some
of today's most exciting developments in art, math, physics, and
computer visualization.
This book takes a creative approach in examining one of the biggest
crises of our time: that of mental suffering, distress and anxiety.
By bringing together essays and dialogues from thinkers and artists
across a range of disciplines, it re-imagines approaches to crisis,
support, and care. Amid growing recognition that mental health is
not only the province of psychiatry and the health sector, but a
concern for the whole community, the book opens up critical new
ways of thinking about our internal lives and the forces that
affect them. The book significantly advances the way we think about
cultural responses to mental health and the understanding of the
struggles of inner life. Featuring both theoretical and practical
examples of the value of using imagination in response to trauma,
anxiety, and depression, The Big Anxiety shows how creativity is
not a luxury, but a means of survival.
Comprised of 45 chapters, written especially for this volume by an
international team of leading experts, The Routledge Companion to
the Philosophies of Painting and Sculpture is the first handbook of
its kind. The editors have organized the chapters helpfully across
eight parts: I: Artforms II: History III: Questions of Form, Style,
and Address IV: Art and Science V: Comparisons among the Arts VI:
Questions of Value VII: Philosophers of Art VIII: Institutional
Questions Individual topics include art and cognitive science,
evolutionary origins of art, art and perception, pictorial realism,
artistic taste, style, issues of race and gender, art and religion,
art and philosophy, and the end of art. The work of selected
philosophers is also discussed, including Diderot, Hegel, Ruskin,
Gombrich, Goodman, Wollheim, and Danto. With a volume introduction
from the editors and comprehensively indexed, The Routledge
Companion to the Philosophies of Painting and Sculpture serves as a
point of entry to the subject for a broad range of students as well
as an up-to-date reference for scholars in the field.
This volume brings philosophers, art historians, intellectual
historians, and literary scholars together to argue for the
philosophical significance of Michael Fried's art history and
criticism. It demonstrates that Fried's work on modernism, artistic
intention, the ontology of art, theatricality, and
anti-theatricality can throw new light on problems in and beyond
philosophical aesthetics. Featuring an essay by Fried and articles
from world-leading scholars, this collection engages with
philosophical themes from Fried's texts, and clarifies the
relevance to his work of philosophers such as Ludwig Wittgenstein,
Stanley Cavell, Morris Weitz, Elizabeth Anscombe, Arthur Danto,
George Dickie, Immanuel Kant, Friedrich Schiller, G. W. F. Hegel,
Arthur Schopenhauer, Friedrich Nietzsche, Denis Diderot, Maurice
Merleau-Ponty, Roland Barthes, Jacques Ranciere, and Soren
Kierkegaard. As it makes a case for the importance of Fried for
philosophy, this volume contributes to current debates in analytic
and continental aesthetics, philosophy of action, philosophy of
history, political philosophy, modernism studies, literary studies,
and art theory.
Disgust is among the strongest of aversions, characterized by
involuntary physical recoil and even nausea. Yet paradoxically,
disgusting objects can sometimes exert a grisly allure, and this
emotion can constitute a positive, appreciative aesthetic response
when exploited by works of art -- a phenomenon labelled here
"aesthetic disgust." While the reactive, visceral quality of
disgust contributes to its misleading reputation as a relatively
"primitive" response mechanism, it is this feature that also gives
it a particular aesthetic power when manifest in art.
Most treatments of disgust mistakenly interpret it as only an
extreme response, thereby neglecting the many subtle ways that it
operates aesthetically. This study calls attention to the diversity
and depth of its uses, analyzing the emotion in detail and
considering the enormous variety of aesthetic forms it can assume
in works of art and --unexpectedly-- even in foods.
In the process of articulating a positive role for disgust, this
book examines the nature of aesthetic apprehension and argues for
the distinctive mode of cognition that disgust affords -- an
intimate apprehension of physical mortality. Despite some
commonalities attached to the meaning of disgust, this emotion
assumes many aesthetic forms: it can be funny, profound, witty,
ironic, unsettling, sorrowful, or gross. To demonstrate this
diversity, several chapters review examples of disgust as it is
aroused by art. The book ends by investigating to what extent
disgust can be discovered in art that is also considered beautiful.
* Post-Bionian field theory is a hot topic in contemporary
psychoanalysis * Psychoanalytic aspects of art theory remain very
popular in psychoanalytic circles * First psychoanalytic book to
look at the work of Cezanne
How does the avant-garde create spaces in everyday life that
subvert regimes of economic and political control? How do art,
aesthetics and activism inform one another? And how do strategic
spaces of creativity become the basis for new forms of production
and governance? The Composition of Movements to Come reconsiders
the history and the practices of the avant-garde, from the
Situationists to the Art Strike, revolutionary Constructivism to
Laibach and Neue Slowenische Kunst, through an autonomist Marxist
framework. Moving the framework beyond an overly narrow class
analysis, the book explores broader questions of the changing
nature of cultural labor and forms of resistance around this labor.
It examines a doubly articulated process of refusal: the refusal of
separating art from daily life and the re-fusing of these
antagonistic energies by capitalist production and governance. This
relationship opens up a new terrain for strategic thought in
relation to everyday politics, where the history of the avant-garde
is no longer separated from broader questions of political economy
or movement, but becomes a point around which to reorient these
considerations.
How to Enjoy Art: A Guide for Everyone provides the tools to
understand and enjoy works of art. Debunking the pervasive idea
that specialist knowledge is required to understand and appreciate
art, instead How to Enjoy Art focuses on experience and pleasure,
demonstrating how anyone can find value and enjoyment in art.
Examples from around the world and throughout art history-from
works by Fra Angelico and Berthe Morisot to Kazuo Shiraga and Kara
Walker-are used to demonstrate how a handful of core strategies and
skills can help enhance the experience of viewing art works. With
these skills, anyone can encounter any work of art-regardless of
media, artist, or period-and find some resonance with their own
experiences. How to Enjoy Art encourages us to rediscover the
fundamental pleasure in viewing art.
Glenn Parsons and Allen Carlson offer an in-depth philosophical
study of the relationship between function and aesthetic value,
breaking with the philosophical tradition of seeing the two as
separate.
They begin by developing and defending, in a general way, the
concept of Functional Beauty, exploring how the role of function in
aesthetic appreciation has been treated by some notable thinkers in
the history of aesthetics. They then consider the relationship to
Functional Beauty of certain views in current aesthetic thought,
especially what we call 'cognitively rich' approaches to the
aesthetic appreciation of both art and nature. Turning to work on
the nature of function in the philosophy of science, they argue
that this line of enquiry can help solve certain philosophical
problems that have been raised for the idea that knowledge of
function plays an important role in aesthetic appreciation.
Although philosophical discussions of aesthetic appreciation tend
to focus largely and sometimes almost exclusively on artworks, the
range of aesthetic appreciation is, of course, much larger. Not
simply art, but also nature, architecture, and even more mundane,
everyday things--cars, tools, clothing, furniture, and sports--are
objects of frequent and enthusiastic aesthetic appreciation.
Accordingly, in the second half of the book, Glen Parsons and Allen
Carlson consider the place and importance of Functional Beauty in
the aesthetic appreciation of a broad range of different kinds of
things. The final chapters explore Functional Beauty in nature and
the natural environment, in architecture and the built environment,
in everyday artifacts, events, and activities, and finally in art
and theartworld. In each case, Parsons and Carlson argue that
Functional Beauty illuminates our aesthetic experiences and helps
to address various theoretical issues raised by these different
objects of appreciation.
Alois Riegl's art history has influenced thinkers as diverse as
Erwin Panofsky, Georg Lukacs, Walter Benjamin, Paul Feyerabend,
Gilles Deteuze, and Felix Guattari. One of the founders of the
modern discipline of art history, Riegl is best known for his
theories of representation. Yet his inquiries into the role of
temporality in artistic production - including his argument that
art conveys a culture's consciousness of time - show him to be a
more wide-ranging and influential commentator on historiographical
issues than has been previously acknowledged. In ""Time's Visible
Surface"", Michael Gubser presents Riegl's work as a sustained
examination of the categories of temporality and history in art.
Supported by a rich exploration of Riegl's writings, Gubser argues
that Riegl viewed artworks as registering historical time visibly
in artistic forms. Gubser's discussion of Riegl's academic milieu
also challenges the widespread belief that Austrian modernism
adopted a self-consciously a historical worldview. By analyzing the
works of Riegl's professors and colleagues at the University of
Vienna, Gubser shows that Riegl's interest in temporality, from his
early articles on calendar art through later volumes on the Roman
art industry and Dutch portraiture, fit into a broad discourse on
time, history, and empiricism that engaged Viennese thinkers such
as the philosopher Franz Brentano, the historian Theodor von
Sickel, and the art historian Franz Wickhoff. By expanding our
understanding of Riegl and his intellectual context, ""Time's
Visible Surface"" demonstrates that Riegl is a pivotal figure in
cultural theory and that fin-de-siecle Vienna holds continued
relevance for today's cultural and philosophical debates.
This book presents a historical panorama of the Polish avant-garde
in Berlin from 19th century historical avant-garde until the recent
art. Looking at specific artistic strategies and development of
modernist paradigm both in the pre- and post-Second World War
period from the perspective of the migration experience, this book
offers a deep insight into mechanisms, relations and identity
programmes of particular artists or groups. It also reveals the
dynamics of eventual cultural exchange or alternative forms of
artistic transformation and message that Polish artists imprinted
in the Berlin's art scene. Whether historical avant-garde or the
neo-avant-garde, the component of novelty inscribed in the term
itself ceases to be a sheer, one-dimensional slogan and reveals a
whole range of cultural projections that artist-migrants are both
creators and the subject of. Here the notion of exoticism,
wilderness, but also critical and ironical approach often
constitute the perception of Polish art in the Berlin milieu.
Do the artist's intentions have anything to do with the making and
appreciation of works of art? In Art and Intention Paisley
Livingston develops a broad and balanced perspective on perennial
disputes between intentionalists and anti-intentionalists in
philosophical aesthetics and critical theory. He surveys and
assesses a wide range of rival assumptions about the nature of
intentions and the status of intentionalist psychology. With
detailed reference to examples from diverse media, art forms, and
traditions, he demonstrates that insights into the multiple
functions of intentions have important implications for our
understanding of artistic creation and authorship, the ontology of
art, conceptions of texts, works, and versions, basic issues
pertaining to the nature of fiction and fictional truth, and the
theory of art interpretation and appreciation. Livingston argues
that neither the inspirationist nor rationalistic conceptions can
capture the blending of deliberate and intentional, spontaneous and
unintentional processes in the creation of art. Texts, works, and
artistic structures and performances cannot be adequately
individuated in the absence of a recognition of the relevant makers
intentions. The distinction between complete and incomplete works
receives an action-theoretic analysis that makes possible an
elucidation of several different senses of 'fragment' in critical
discourse. Livingston develops an account of authorship, contending
that the recognition of intentions is in fact crucial to our
understanding of diverse forms of collective art-making. An
artist's short-term intentions and long-term plans and policies
interact in complex ways in the emergence of an artistic oeuvre,
and our uptake of such attitudes makes an important difference to
our appreciation of the relations between items belonging to a
single life-work. The intentionalism Livingston advocates is,
however, a partial one, and accomodates a number of important
anti-intentionalist contentions. Intentions are fallible, and works
of art, like other artefacts, can be put to a bewildering diversity
of uses. Yet some important aspects of art's meaning and value are
linked to the artists aims and activities.
Art Fundamentals 2nd Edition is a fully revised and updated
back-to-basics title, packed with the fundamental concepts,
conventions, and theory every beginner artist needs to create
successful work. This essential book is written by industry experts
who thoroughly address key basics including color and light,
composition, perspective and depth, and anatomy in a series of
insightful chapters. As well as being the perfect introduction for
newcomers, Art Fundamentals 2nd Edition also offers experienced
artists the chance to brush up on their theory and discover new
tricks, tips, and techniques to advance their art even further.
Richly illustrated throughout for optimal learning, each section of
the book is specifically designed to guide the reader through the
essential yet often challenging elements that make up the
foundations of art, no matter which medium or technique is used. As
fascinating and illuminating as it is practical and essential, Art
Fundamentals 2nd Edition contains the foundations of art,
presented, taught, and completely demystified for the today's
artist.
This book analyses how three artists - Adrian Piper, Nancy Spero
and Mary Kelly - worked with the visual dimensions of language in
the 1960s and 1970s. These artists used text and images of writing
to challenge female stereotypes, addressing viewers and asking them
to participate in the project of imagining women beyond familiar
words and images of subordination. The book explores this dimension
of their work through the concept of 'the other woman', a utopian
wish to reach women and correspond with them across similarities
and differences. To make the artwork's aspirations more concrete,
it places the artists in correspondence with three writers - Angela
Davis, Valerie Solanas, and Laura Mulvey - who also addressed the
limited range of images through which women are allowed to become
visible. -- .
This book brings a practitioner's insight to bear on socially
situated art practice through a first-hand glimpse into the
development, organisation and delivery of art projects with social
agendas. Issues examined include the artist's role in building
creative frameworks, the relationship of collaboration to
participation, management of collective input, and wider
repercussions of the ways that projects are instigated, negotiated
and funded. The book contributes to ongoing debates on
ethics/aesthetics for art initiatives where process, product and
social relations are integral to the mix, and addresses issues of
practical functionality in relation to social outcome.
Criticism of contemporary art is split by an opposition between
activism and the critical function of form. Yet the deeper, more
subterranean terms of art-judgment are largely neglected on both
sides. These essays combine a re-examination of the terms of
judgement of contemporary art with critical interpretations of
individual works and exhibitions by Luis Camnitzer, Marcel Duchamp,
Matias Faldbakken, Anne Imhof and Cady Noland. The book moves from
philosophical issues, via the lingering shadows of
medium-specificity (in photography and art music), and the changing
states of museums, to analyses of the peculiar ways that works of
art relate to time.To give artistic form to crisis, it is
suggested, one needs to understand contemporary art's own
constitutive crisis of form.
This book has been a classic color theory reference in Europe for
several years, and is available now, for the first time, in English
translation. The book is arranged to follow light from a stimulus
outside the human body, through the reaction of the visual organs
of the body and ultimately to the occurrence of the visual
experience in the brain. Colorful schematic drawings and
photographs presented with explanatory captions demonstrate many
elements of color theory from the organization of color to the
perception of a rainbow. Beyond as explanation of the actual
processes, Mr Zwimpfer demonstrates the total relationship which
takes the perception of color beyond a mere passive registering,
such as in photography, to a three-dimensional perception of our
world. The book will fascinate and inform artists, photographers,
students and others who are interested in color theory.
Over 1,400 articles in this volume cover all the major artistic
developments in Central and South America and the Caribbean from
the colonial period to the present. From 16th-century Spanish
colonial architects such as Fray Andres San Miguel to European
explorers such as Alexander von Humboldt to contemporary artists
such as Debora Arango, the entries chart the adaptations of
European artistic traditions and the evolution of individual
national cultures in this area of burgeoning importance in history
and the visual arts.
Whether it was the demands of life, leisure, or a combination of
both that forced our hands, we have developed a myriad of
artefacts--maps, notes, descriptions, diagrams, flow-charts,
photographs, paintings, and prints--that stand for other things.
Most agree that images and their close relatives are special
because, in some sense, they look like what they are about. This
simple claim is the starting point for most philosophical
investigations into the nature of depiction. On Images argues that
this starting point is fundamentally misguided. Whether a
representation is an image depends not on how it is perceived but
on how it relates to others within a system. This kind of approach,
first championed by Nelson Goodman in his Languages of Art, has not
found many supporters, in part because of weaknesses with Goodman's
account. On Images shows that a properly crafted structural account
of pictures has many advantages over the perceptual accounts that
dominate the literature on this topic. In particular, it explains
the close relationship between pictures, diagrams, graphs and other
kinds of non-linguistic representation. It undermines the claim
that pictures are essentially visual by showing that audio
recordings, tactile line drawings, and other non-visual
representations are pictorial. Also, by avoiding explaining images
in terms of how we perceive them, this account sheds new light on
why pictures seem so perceptually special in the first place. This
discussion of picture perception recasts some old debates on the
topic, suggests further lines of philosophical and empirical
research, and ultimately leads to a new perspective on pictorial
realism.
How to Write About Contemporary Art is the definitive guide to
writing engagingly about the art of our time. Invaluable for
students, arts professionals and other aspiring writers, the book
first navigates readers through the key elements of style and
content, from the aims and structure of a piece to its tone and
language. Brimming with practical tips that range across the
complete spectrum of art-writing, the second part of the book is
organized around its specific forms, including academic essays;
press releases and news articles; texts for auction and exhibition
catalogues, gallery guides and wall labels; op-ed journalism and
exhibition reviews; and writing for websites and blogs. In
counseling the reader against common pitfalls such as jargon and
poor structure Gilda Williams points instead to the power of close
looking and research, showing how to deploy language effectively;
how to develop new ideas; and how to construct compelling texts.
More than 30 illustrations throughout support closely analysed case
studies of the best writing, in Source Texts by 64 authors,
including Claire Bishop, Thomas Crow, T.J. Demos, Okwui Enwezor,
Dave Hickey, John Kelsey, Chris Kraus, Rosalind Krauss, Stuart
Morgan, Hito Steyerl, and Adam Szymczyk. Supplemented by a general
bibliography, advice on the use and misuse of grammar, and tips on
how to construct your own contemporary art library, How to Write
About Contemporary Art is the essential handbook for all those
interested in communicating about the art of today."
The Humanities Through the Arts examines how values are revealed in
the arts while keeping in mind a basic question: "What is art?" It
binds us together as a people by revealing the most important
values of our culture. This program's genre-based approach offers
students the opportunity to understand the relationship of the arts
to human values by examining, in-depth, each of the major artistic
media: painting, sculpture, architecture, literature, theater,
music, dance, photography, cinema, and television and video art.
Subject matter, form, and content in each of the arts supply the
framework for careful analysis. All of this is achieved with an
exceptionally vivid and complete illustration program. The wide
range of opportunities for criticism and analysis helps the reader
synthesize the complexities of the arts and their interaction with
values of many kinds. The text contains detailed discussion and
interactive responses to the problems inherent in a close study of
the arts and values of our time.
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