Download or read book Contemporary Drift written by Theodore Martin and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2017-05-30 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What does it mean to call something “contemporary”? More than simply denoting what’s new, it speaks to how we come to know the present we’re living in and how we develop a shared story about it. The story of trying to understand the present is an integral, yet often unnoticed, part of the literature and film of our moment. In Contemporary Drift, Theodore Martin argues that the contemporary is not just a historical period but also a conceptual problem, and he claims that contemporary genre fiction offers a much-needed resource for resolving that problem. Contemporary Drift combines a theoretical focus on the challenge of conceptualizing the present with a historical account of contemporary literature and film. Emphasizing both the difficulty and the necessity of historicizing the contemporary, the book explores how recent works of fiction depict life in an age of global capitalism, postindustrialism, and climate change. Through new histories of the novel of manners, film noir, the Western, detective fiction, and the postapocalyptic novel, Martin shows how the problem of the contemporary preoccupies a wide range of novelists and filmmakers, including Zadie Smith, Colson Whitehead, Vikram Chandra, China Miéville, Kelly Reichardt, and the Coen brothers. Martin argues that genre provides these artists with a formal strategy for understanding both the content and the concept of the contemporary. Genre writing, with its mix of old and new, brings to light the complicated process by which we make sense of our present and determine what belongs to our time.
Download or read book Calligraphy written by Denise Lach and published by . This book was released on 2014 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An invaluable sourcebook for both enthusiastic beginners and experienced calligraphers who wish to let their imaginations run free
Download or read book On Contemporary Art written by Cesar Aira and published by David Zwirner Books. This book was released on 2018-11-20 with total page 66 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Translated into English for the first time, On Contemporary Art, a speech by the renowned novelist César Aira, was delivered at a 2010 colloquium in Madrid dedicated to bridging the gap between writing and the visual arts. On Aira’s dizzying and dazzling path, everything comes under question—from reproducibility of artworks to the value of the written word itself. In the end, Aira leaves us stranded on the bridge between writing and art that he set out to construct in the first place, flailing as we try to make sense of where we stand. Aira’s On Contemporary Art exemplifies what the ekphrasis series is dedicated to doing—exploring the space in which words give meaning to objects, and objects shape our words. Like the great writers Walter Benjamin and Hermann Broch before him, Aira operates in the space between fiction and essay writing, art and analysis. Pursuing questions about reproducibility, art making, and limits of language, Aira’s unique voice adds new insights to the essential conversations that continue to inform our understanding of art.
Download or read book What Is Contemporary Art written by Terry E. Smith and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2009-10-15 with total page 345 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Who gets to say what counts as contemporary art? Artists, critics, curators, gallerists, auctioneers, collectors, or the public? Revealing how all of these groups have shaped today’s multifaceted definition, Terry Smith brilliantly shows that an historical approach offers the best answer to the question: What is Contemporary Art? Smith argues that the most recognizable kind is characterized by a return to mainstream modernism in the work of such artists as Richard Serra and Gerhard Richter, as well as the retro-sensationalism of figures like Damien Hirst and Takashi Murakami. At the same time, Smith reveals, postcolonial artists are engaged in a different kind of practice: one that builds on local concerns and tackles questions of identity, history, and globalization. A younger generation embodies yet a third approach to contemporaneity by investigating time, place, mediation, and ethics through small-scale, closely connective art making. Inviting readers into these diverse yet overlapping art worlds, Smith offers a behind-the-scenes introduction to the institutions, the personalities, the biennials, and of course the works that together are defining the contemporary. The resulting map of where art is now illuminates not only where it has been but also where it is going.
Download or read book Designs for an Anthropology of the Contemporary written by Paul Rabinow and published by Duke University Press. This book was released on 2008-11-10 with total page 150 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this compact volume two of anthropology’s most influential theorists, Paul Rabinow and George E. Marcus, engage in a series of conversations about the past, present, and future of anthropological knowledge, pedagogy, and practice. James D. Faubion joins in several exchanges to facilitate and elaborate the dialogue, and Tobias Rees moderates the discussions and contributes an introduction and an afterword to the volume. Most of the conversations are focused on contemporary challenges to how anthropology understands its subject and how ethnographic research projects are designed and carried out. Rabinow and Marcus reflect on what remains distinctly anthropological about the study of contemporary events and processes, and they contemplate productive new directions for the field. The two converge in Marcus’s emphasis on the need to redesign pedagogical practices for training anthropological researchers and in Rabinow’s proposal of collaborative initiatives in which ethnographic research designs could be analyzed, experimented with, and transformed. Both Rabinow and Marcus participated in the milestone collection Writing Culture: The Poetics and Politics of Ethnography. Published in 1986, Writing Culture catalyzed a reassessment of how ethnographers encountered, studied, and wrote about their subjects. In the opening conversations of Designs for an Anthropology of the Contemporary, Rabinow and Marcus take stock of anthropology’s recent past by discussing the intellectual scene in which Writing Culture intervened, the book’s contributions, and its conceptual limitations. Considering how the field has developed since the publication of that volume, they address topics including ethnography’s self-reflexive turn, scholars’ increased focus on questions of identity, the Public Culture project, science and technology studies, and the changing interests and goals of students. Designs for an Anthropology of the Contemporary allows readers to eavesdrop on lively conversations between anthropologists who have helped to shape their field’s recent past and are deeply invested in its future.
Download or read book Best of 500 Contemporary Interiors written by Wim Pauwels and published by Beta-Plus. This book was released on 2019-07 with total page 448 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Showcases the 500 best projects over years of Beta-Plus features on contemporary architecture and interiors. Beautiful and inspirational, this book is filled with sumptuous color photographs of projects from around the world.
Download or read book Aspects of Contemporary Book Design written by Richard Hendel and published by University of Iowa Press. This book was released on 2013-06-15 with total page 294 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this manifestly practical book, Richard Hendel has invited book and journal designers he admires to describe how they approach and practice the craft of book design. Designers with interesting and varied careers in the field, who work with contemporary technology in today’s publishing environment, describe their methods of managing the challenges presented by specific types of books, presented side by side with numerous images from those books. Not an instruction manual but a unique, on-the-job, title page–to–index guide to the ways that professional British and American designers think about design, Aspects of Contemporary Book Design continues the conversation that began with Hendel’s 1998 classic, On Book Design. Contributing designers who focus on solving problems posed by nonfiction, fiction, cookbooks, plays, poetry, illustrated books, and journals include Cherie Westmoreland, Amy Ruth Buchanan, Mindy Basinger Hill, Nola Burger, Ron Costley, Kristina Kachele, Barbara Wiedemann, and Sue Hall, as well as a host of other designers, typesetters, editors, and even an author. Abbey Gaterud attempts to define the conundrum that the e-book presents to designers; Kent Lew describes the evolution of his Whitman typeface family; Charles Ellertson reflects upon the vital relationship between the typesetter and the designer; and Sean Magee writes about the uneasy alliance between designers and editors. In an extended essay that is as frank and funny as it is illuminating, Andrew Barker takes the reader deep into the morass—excavating the fine, finer, and finest details of working through a series design. At the heart of this copiously illustrated book is the enduring need for design that clarifies the way for the reader, whether on the printed page or on the computer screen. Blending his roles as designer, author, interviewer, and editor, Hendel reaches across both sides of the drafting table—both real and virtual—to create a book that will appeal to aspiring and seasoned book designers as well as writers, editors, and readers who want to know more about the visual presentation of the written word.
Download or read book The Era of Choice written by Edward C. Rosenthal Ph.D. and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2006-09-22 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How today's cornucopia of choices has transformed our lives and our culture, from the foundations of scientific theory to the anxiety of everyday decisions. Today most of us are awash with choices. The cornucopia of material goods available to those of us in the developed world can turn each of us into a kid in a candy store; but our delight at picking the prize is undercut by our regret at lost opportunities. And what's the criterion for choosing anything—material, spiritual, the path taken or not taken—when we have lost our faith in everything? In The Era of Choice Edward Rosenthal argues that choice, and having to make choices, has become the most important influence in both our personal lives and our cultural expression. Choice, he claims, has transformed how we live, how we think, and who we are. This transformation began in the nineteenth century, catalyzed by the growing prosperity of the Industrial Age and a diminishing faith in moral and scientific absolutes. The multiplicity of choices forces us to form oppositions; this, says Rosenthal, has spawned a keen interest in dualism, dilemmas, contradictions, and paradoxes. In response, we have developed mechanisms to hedge, compromise, and to synthesize. Rosenthal looks at the scientific and philosophical theories and cultural movements that choice has influenced—from physics (for example, Niels Bohr's theory that light is both particle and wave) to postmodernism, from Disney trailers to multiculturalism. He also reveals the effect of choice on the personal level, where we grapple with decisions that range from which wine to have with dinner to whether to marry or divorce, as we hurtle through lives of instant gratification, accelerated consumption, trend, change, and speed. But we have discovered, writes Rosenthal, that sometimes, we can have our cake and eat it, too.
Download or read book The Contemporary Art Gallery written by David Carrier and published by Cambridge Scholars Publishing. This book was released on 2016-09-23 with total page 115 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Everyone who looks at contemporary art is familiar with galleries. But visual features of these mysterious temples tend to be taken for granted. The basic purpose of this book is to enliven the reader’s latent knowledge of galleries, including architectural motifs, the intended impression that is conveyed to the visitor, and human interactions within them. The contemporary art world system includes artists’ studios, art galleries, homes of collec-tors and public art museums. To comprehend art, one needs to understand these settings and how it travels through them. The contemporary art gallery is a store where luxury goods are sold. What distinguishes it from stores selling other luxuries – upscale clothing, jewelry, and posh cars – is the nature of the merchandise. While much has been written about the art, this book uncovers the secretive culture of the galleries themselves. The gallery is the public site where art is first seen – anyone can come and look for free. This store, a commercial site, is where aesthetic judgments are made. Art’s value is determined in this marketplace by the consensus formed by public opinion, professional re-viewers and sales. The gallery, then, is the nexus of the enigmatic, billion dollar art world, and it is that space that is dissected here. The first chapter briefly describes the beginnings of the present contemporary art gallery. The second presents the experience of gallery going, presenting summary accounts of vis-its to some contemporary galleries. The third expands and extends that analysis, with de-tailed close up descriptions and comparative evaluations of many diverse contemporary galleries, in order to identify the challenges provided by these marvelous places. Then the fourth chapter indicates why, in the near future, due to the proliferation of myriad art fairs and online platforms extant today, such galleries might disappear altogether.
Download or read book The Contemporary American Poets written by Mark Strand and published by Signet Book. This book was released on 1969 with total page 406 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Contains poems by A.R. Ammons, Alan Ansen, John Ashbery, Marvin Bell, Michael Benedikt, John Berryman, Elizabeth Bishop, Robert Bly, Philip Booth, Edgar Bowers, Tom Clark, Gregory Corso, Henri Coulette, Robert Greeley, J.V. Cunningham, James Dickey, William Dickey, Alan Dugan, Alvin Feinman, Edward Field, Donald Finkel, Isabella Gardner, Jack Gilbert, Allen Ginsberg, Louise Gluck, Paul Goodman, John Haines, Donald Hall, Kenneth O. Hanson, Anthony Hecht, Daryl Hine, Daniel Hoffman, John Hollander, Richard Howard, Barbara Howes, Robert Huff, Richard Hugo, David Ignatow, Randall Jarrell, LeRoi Jones, Donald Justice, Weldon Kees, X.J. Kennedy, Galway Kinnell, Carolyn Kizer, Kenneth Koch, Al Lee, Denise Levertov, Philip Levine, Laurence Lieberman, John Logan, Robert Lowell, William H. Matchett, E.L. Mayo, William Meredith, James Merrill, W.S. Merwin, Howard Moss, Stanley Moss, Lisel Mueller, Howard Nemerov, Frank O'Hara, Charles Olson, Robert Pack, Donald Petersen, Sylvia Plath, Adrienne Rich, Theodore Roethke, James Schuyler, Winfield Townley Scott, Anne Sexton, Karl Shapiro, Charles Simic, Louis Simpson, L.E. Sissman, William Jay Smith, W.D. Snodgrass, Gary Snyder, William Stafford, Mark Strand, Robert Sward, May Swenson, James Tate, Constance Urdang, Peter Viereck, David Wagoner, Ds.
Download or read book Navigators of the Contemporary written by David A. Westbrook and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2009-05-15 with total page 163 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As the image of anthropologists exploring exotic locales and filling in blanks on the map has faded, the idea that cultural anthropology has much to say about the contemporary world has likewise diminished. In an increasingly smaller world, how can anthropology help us to tackle the concerns of a global society? David A. Westbrook argues that the traditional tool of the cultural anthropologist—ethnography—can still function as an intellectually exciting way to understand our interconnected, yet mysterious worlds. Navigators of the Contemporary describes the changing nature of ethnography as anthropologists use it to analyze places closer to home. Westbrook maintains that a conversational style of ethnography can help us look beyond our assumptions and gain new insight into arenas of contemporary life such as corporations, financial institutions, science, the military, and religion. Westbrook’s witty, absorbing book is a friendly challenge to anthropologists to shed light on the present and join broader streams of intellectual life. And for those outside the discipline, his inspiring vision of ethnography opens up the prospect of understanding our own world in much greater depth.
Download or read book How to Write About Contemporary Art written by Gilda Williams and published by Thames & Hudson. This book was released on 2014-10-14 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An essential handbook for students and professionals on writing eloquently, accurately, and originally about contemporary art 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.
Download or read book Contemporary Drawing written by Margaret Davidson and published by Watson-Guptill. This book was released on 2014-01-07 with total page 192 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Drawing is experiencing an unparalleled surge in the art world. Passé notions that once defined drawing as being a preparatory stage for painting or sculpture have long since been cast aside. Drawing is now fully recognized as its own art form—in the biennials, art fairs, museum exhibitions, and beyond. Drawing has come of age. Contemporary artists are increasingly discovering that drawing is something unique and different from painting. It is an intense, sensitive, compelling, personal, and utterly direct art form, one with its own concepts, characteristics, and techniques. In addition, contemporary drawing is not governed by any particular imagery, but rather encompasses a variety of approaches, including realist, abstract, modernist, and post-modernist. Contemporary Drawing delves into the essential and far-reaching concepts of this medium, exploring surface, mark, space, composition, scale, materials, and intentionality in turn. Key techniques, such as using nature to induce marks and working with a checklist to determine a drawing’s problems, are introduced throughout. Plus, an in-depth chapter examines a number of artists, such as William Kentridge and Gego, who are breaking traditional boundaries that separate one artistic discipline from another. Lushly illustrated by a wide range of highly accomplished contemporary artists, Contemporary Drawing offers a broad perspective on this expansive and energized field of art.
Download or read book Defining Contemporary Art written by Daniel Birnbaum and published by Phaidon Press. This book was released on 2011-11-07 with total page 448 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the mid-1980s the sprouting of new movements that had driven modern art since the nineteenth century finally went dormant, sputtering out with a last few half-hearted lels ('pattern painting', 'neo-geo', 'commodity art'). But this was not the end of art history -- far from it. In the years since, art's creative development has remained more vibrant than ever, resulting in a staggering diversity of new forms. Defining Contemporary Art responds to this unique landscape with an innovative approach to art history. Assembled and written by eight of the most prominent curators working today, all of whom have both witnessed and shaped this period, Defining Contemporary Art tells the story of the two hundred pivotal artworks of the past twenty-five years. These artworks include not only the most talked out pieces but also the quietly influential works, those which may have been overlooked at the time of their making but which went on to change the paradigm of their era. Arranged year by year, these two hundred works provide a true chronological depiction of creativity in our era, forming a mosaic in which readers may find their own patterns..
Download or read book Feast written by Stephanie Smith and published by Smart Museum of Art, the University of C. This book was released on 2013 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The companion to a one-of-a-kind exhibition at the University of Chicago's Smart Museum of Art, Feast: Radical Hospitality in Contemporary Art explores the role of the meal in contemporary art. Feast offers the first survey of the artist-orchestrated meal: since the 1930s, the act of sharing food and drink has been used to advance aesthetic goals and foster critical engagement with the culture of the moment. Both exhibition catalogue and reader, this richly illus- trated book offers an interdisciplinary exploration of the art of the meal and its relationship to questions about hospitality, politics, and culture. From the Italian Futurists' banquets in the 1930s, to 1960s and '70s conceptual and performative work, to the global prevalence of socially engaged practices today, Feast considers a diverse group of artists who have transformed the meal into a compelling artistic medium. After an introductory essay by curator Stephanie Smith, the book includes new interviews with over twenty contributing artists and reprinted excerpts of classic texts. It also features a selection of contextual essays contributed by an international group of critics, writers, curators, and scholars.
Download or read book Seven Days in the Art World written by Sarah Thornton and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2008-11-17 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A fly-on-the-wall account of the smart and strange subcultures that make, trade, curate, collect, and hype contemporary art. The art market has been booming. Museum attendance is surging. More people than ever call themselves artists. Contemporary art has become a mass entertainment, a luxury good, a job description, and, for some, a kind of alternative religion. In a series of beautifully paced narratives, Sarah Thornton investigates the drama of a Christie's auction, the workings in Takashi Murakami's studios, the elite at the Basel Art Fair, the eccentricities of Artforum magazine, the competition behind an important art prize, life in a notorious art-school seminar, and the wonderland of the Venice Biennale. She reveals the new dynamics of creativity, taste, status, money, and the search for meaning in life. A judicious and juicy account of the institutions that have the power to shape art history, based on hundreds of interviews with high-profile players, Thornton's entertaining ethnography will change the way you look at contemporary culture.
Download or read book How to Read Contemporary Art written by Michael Wilson and published by Harry N. Abrams. This book was released on 2013-05-14 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Today's artists create work that's challenging, complicated, and often perplexing, and this book offers a guide to understanding-and enjoying- the wide range of works on display in museums and galleries worldwide. Organized alphabetically, the book includes more than two hundred works of art made in the last twenty years by living artists from all over the globe, encompassing photography, installation, sculpture, painting, video art, perfomance, and more. Author Michael Wilson explores the impact of a broad selection of the most prominent artists at work around the world, including Francis Alys, Allora & Calzadilla, Luc Tuymans, and Marina Abramovic." - Excerpt from back cover.
