Revelry and Risk: Approaches to Social Practice, Or Something Like ThatTed Purves, Sara Thacher
Lulu.com, 2007
"Revelry and Risk" inaugurates the publication program of the Social Practice Area at the California College of the Arts. It features the work of Bridget Barnhart, Anne Devine, Jennifer Durban, Amanda Herman, and Carly Troncale with essays by Ted Purves and Randall Szott.The projects presented in this book span such disparate practices as urban and rural interventions, curation, guerilla architecture, social sculpture, project-based community practice, service dispersals and performance. These varied forms of public strategy are critically linked by theories of relational art, social aesthetics, pluralism and democracy.
Presumed innocence: photographic perspectives of children : from the collection of Anthony and Beth TerranaKate Dempsey
DeCordova Museum and Sculpture Park, 2008
From Ansel Adams' harrowing 1940s documentary photographs of transient migrant workers' children to Sally Mann's simultaneously erotic and innocent portraits of her adolescent children and other pre- and post-pubescent girls, images of children have fascinated and frustrated viewers since the inception of the medium. This excellent collection of vintage and contemporary photographs, spanning from the early twentieth century until now, covers all of the relevant genres, from documentary reportage to digitally manipulated constructions. It includes well-known black-and-white images by renowned masters, as well as very recent color work by American and European photographers alike. Among the 85 photographers included are Ansel Adams, Diane Arbus, Julie Blackmon, Manual Alvarez Bravo, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Bruce Davidson, Rineke Dijkstra, Elliot Erwitt, Lalla Essaydi, Larry Fink, Robert Frank, Emmet Gowin, Pieter Hugo, Dorothea Lange, Gillian Laub, Helen Levitt, Sally Mann, Mary Ellen Mark, Tina Modotti, Abelardo Morell, Martin Parr and Doris Ulmann. Scholarly essays by Rachel Rosenfield Lafo of the DeCordova Museum and Barnard College's Anne Higonnet discuss the history of photography and changing concepts of childhood in visual imagery, respectively.
Alloy of love: Dario RobletoElizabeth Dunbar
Frances Young Tang Teaching Museum and Art Gallery at Skidmore College, 2008
San Antonio-based artist Dario Robleto is well known for his astonishing hand-crafted objects: works that reflect his intense investigatioin of such wide-ranging topics as science, music, popular culture, philosophy, war, and American history. Utilizing a lengthy roster of bizarre and disparate materials - including melted and pulverized vinyl records, artifacts gleaned from battlefields, rare herbs and minerals, and even prehistoric fossils and human bones - Robleto excavates conceptually-loaded elements from the past. He then seamlessly combines and refashions these potent details into poetic works that speak volumes about histoy and nostalgia, as well as concerns about the present condition of our world and its future. The resulting works are much more than just the sum of their constituent parts or factual interpretations of particular events and personalities; rather, they are sincere and emotional mediations on love, loss, spirituality, and ultimately, healing.
Conservation at the Art Institute of ChicagoFrank Zuccari
Yale University Press, 2005
This fascinating volume explores how research, craft, and technology are united in the Art Institute of Chicago’s mission to preserve its collection and further art-historical knowledge. Addressing the many challenges conservators face, the publication highlights their work on objects from throughout the museum, including books, furniture, electronic media, paintings, photographs, posters, sculpture, and textiles.An introductory essay traces the development of the profession and its specific history at the Art Institute. Case studies written by the museum’s conservators and curators examine diverse works ranging from an ancient Egyptian statue of Osiris to Bruce Nauman’s video Clown Torture. The authors explore how they determine appropriate treatment, uncover an artist’s intentions and techniques, and employ pathbreaking new technologies.
The sculpture of Louise Nevelson: constructing a legendBrooke Kamin Rapaport
Yale University Press, 2007
Louise Nevelson (1900–1988) was a towering figure in postwar American art, exerting great influence with her monumental installations, innovative sculptures made of found objects, and celebrated public artworks. The Sculpture of Louise Nevelson focuses on all phases of the artist’s remarkable ascent to the top of the art world, from her groundbreaking works of the 1940s to complex pieces completed in the late 1980s. The most extensive study of Nevelson to be published in over 20 years, this beautifully illustrated book also demonstrates how Nevelson’s flamboyant style and carefully cultivated persona enhanced her reputation as an artist of the first rank.
Essays by distinguished scholars examine a wide variety of important issues and themes throughout Nevelson’s career, including the role of monochromatic color in her painted wooden sculpture; the art-historical context of her work; her acclaimed large-scale commissioned artworks, which established her as a central figure in the public art revival of the late 1960s; and her “self-fashioning” as a celebrated artist, particularly her origins as a Ukrainian-born Jewish immigrant to the United States. An illustrated chronology and exhibition history accompany the text.
Published in conjunction with the first major exhibition of Nevelson’s work in America since 1980, this book provides essential information on and insights into the study of a revolutionary 20th-century artist.
The Life and Times of Martha Washington in the Twenty-First CenturyFrank Miller, Dave Gibbons
Dark Horse Comics, 2009
A masterpiece nearly twenty years in the making, this archival, oversized, and slipcased hardcover volume contains the complete life story of Martha Washington, the twenty-first century freedom fighter created by comic-book megastars Frank Miller (Sin City, 300) and Dave Gibbons (Watchmen). Our story begins in the squalid corridors of a maximum-security housing project, where a young girl will rise from the war-torn streets of Chicago to battle injustice in a world insane with corruption. Her fight will take her far, from the frontlines of the second American Civil War, to the cold, unforgiving reaches of space. She will be called a hero, a traitor, and nearly everything in between, but all along the way, her courage, her integrity, and her unwavering commitment to that most valuable of rights - liberty - will inspire a movement that will never surrender!
Manga Kamishibai: The Art of Japanese Paper TheaterEric P. Nash, Frederik L. Schodt
Abrams ComicArts, 2009
Before giant robots, space ships, and masked super heroes filled the pages of Japanese comic books--known as manga--such characters were regularly seen on the streets of Japan inkamishibaistories.Manga Kamishibai: The Art of Japanese Paper Theatertells the history of this fascinating and nearly vanished Japanese art form that paved the way for modern-day comic books, and is the missing link in the development of modern manga. During the height ofkamishibaiin the 1930s, storytellers would travel to villages and set up theirbutais(miniature wooden prosceniums), through which illustrated boards were shown. The storytellers acted as entertainers and reporters, narrating tales that ranged from action-packed westerns, period pieces, traditional folk tales, and melodramas, to nightly news reporting on World War II. More than just explaining the pictures, a good storyteller would act out the parts of each character with different voices and facial expressions. Through extensive research and interviews, author Eric P. Nash pieces together the remarkable history of this art and its creators. With rare images reproduced for the first time from Japanese archives, including full-lengthkamishibaistories, combined with expert writing, this book is an essential guide to the origins of manga.
Andy Warhol: The Last DecadeJoseph D. Ketner, II
Prestel Pub, 2009
In the last decade before his death in 1987, Warhol continued to produce mesmerizing works at an astounding pace. Influenced by the most prominent artists of the 1980s, including Basquiat, Haring, Schnabel, and Clemente, Warhol experimented with a combination of painting and screen printing to develop an extraordinary vocabulary of images that traversed a variety of genres. The result is a remarkable output, collected here in this companion to a touring exhibition organized by the Milwaukee Art Museum. This catalogue delves into the range of works Warhol was creating during his last years, including abstract paintings, collaborations, and his final self-portraits. Essays by Keith Hartley and Gregory Volk and contributions by Bruno Bischofberger, Keith Haring, and Julian Schnabel round out this compelling look at an artist whose most fecund work may have been produced in his last years.
Slash: Paper Under the KnifeDavid Revere McFadden
5 Continents Editions, 2009
Eclectic, eccentric and tirelessly innovative, art crafted from cut paper has experienced an exciting renaissance in recent years. Published to accompany a traveling exhibit opening at the Museum of Arts and Design in New York,Slash:Paper Under the Knifeexamines the resurgence of traditional handcraft materials and techniques in contemporary art and design. Highlighting the work of forty-five international artists, among them Olafur Eliasson, Tom Friedman, William Kentridge, and Kara Walker,nbsp;the book features not only cut but also burned, torn, laser-cut, shredded and sculpted paper art. In addition, the book includes cut paper animation, as well as cut paper incorporated in photography and fashion. Works range from small-scale intricate cuttings to large-scale architectural inventions and sculptures. With an essay by well-known decorative arts expert nbsp;David Revere McFadden, this singular book reveals that, with ingenuity and craftsmanship, one of our most familiar implements can be transformed into unforgettable works of art.
Victory gardens 2007+Amy Franceschini
Gallery 16 Editions, 2008
Victory Gardens 2007 chronicles Amy Franceschini's inspired re-imagining of the original wartime Victory Garden program. The book features essays by Lucy Lippard and Mike Davis along with historical photos and context, and project documentation and insight. Franceschini's Victory Gardens 2007+ was presented as a series of actions, sculptural icons, and ephemera during the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art SECA Award show in January of 2007. The project was initially a small pilot program designed to evolve into a larger plan for a city supported food system. The goal was to create a community of food producers through public outreach and education. In her introduction in the book Franceschini explains 'I worked idealistically with the hope that a practical program would form; one that could be implemented, practiced, and maintained - and it has. This project is both artwork and democracy in action. It is another reminder that grassroots efforts engage and mobilize communities and tune government to create change. This city IS ours!...I hope the information in this book will pay homage to a past, present, and future of food production within cities.'
The everyday life readerBen Highmore
Routledge, 2002
The Everyday Life Readerbrings together a wide range of thinkers from Freud to Baudrillard with primary sources on everyday life such as the Mass Observation survey and key texts by Michel de Certeau and Henri Lefebvre, to provide a comprehensive resource on theories of everyday life. Ben Highmore's introduction surveys the development of thought about everyday life, setting theories in their social and historical context, and each themed section opens with an essay introducing the debates. Sections include: * Situating the Everyday * Everyday Life and National Culture * Ethnography Near and Far * Reclamation Work * Everyday Things
Nowtopia: how pirate programmers, outlaw bicyclists, and vacant-lot gardeners are inventing the future todayChris Carlsson
AK Press, 2008
Outlaw bicycling, urban permaculture, biofuels, free software, and even the Burning Man festival are windows into a scarcely visible social transformation that is redefining politics as we know it. As capitalism continues to corral every square inch of the globe into its logic of money and markets, new practices are emerging through which people are taking back their time and technological know-how. In small, under-the-radar ways, they are making life better right now, simultaneously building the foundation-technically and socially-for a genuine movement of liberation from market life. Nowtopia uncovers the resistance of a slowly recomposing working class in America. Rarely defining themselves by what they do for a living, people from all walks of life are doing incredible amounts of labor in their "non-work" time, creating immediate practical improvements in daily life. The social networks they create, and the practical experience of cooperating outside of economic regulation, become a breeding ground for new strategies to confront the commodification to which capitalism reduces us all. The practices outlined in Nowtopia embody a deep challenge to the basic underpinnings of modern life, as a new ecologically driven politics emerges from below, reshaping our assumptions about science, technology, and human potential. Chris Carlsson, executive director of the multimedia history project "Shaping San Francisco," is a writer, publisher, editor, and community organizer. He has edited four collections of political and historical essays. He helped launch the monthly bike-ins known as Critical Mass, and was the longtime editor of Processed World magazine.
Design activism: beautiful strangeness for a sustainable worldAlastair Fuad-Luke
Earthscan, 2009
Design academics and practitioners are facing a multiplicity of challenges in a dynamic, complex, world moving faster than the current design paradigm which is largely tied to the values and imperatives of commercial enterprise. Current education and practice need to evolve to ensure that the discipline of design meets sustainability drivers and equips students, teachers and professionals for the near-future. New approaches, methods and tools are urgently required as sustainability expands the context for design and what it means to be a 'designer'. Design activists, who comprise a diverse range of designers, teachers and other actors, are setting new ambitions for design. They seek to fundamentally challenge how, where and when design can catalyse positive impacts to address sustainability. They are also challenging who can utilise the power of the design process. To date, examination of contemporary and emergent design activism is poorly represented in the literature. This book will provide a rigorous exploration of design activism that will re-vitalise the design debate and provide a solid platform for students, teachers, design professionals and other disciplines interested in transformative (design) activism.Design Activism provides a comprehensive study of contemporary and emergent design activism. This activism has a dual aim - to make positive impacts towards more sustainable ways of living and working; and to challenge and reinvigorate design praxis,. It will collate, synthesise and analyse design activist approaches, processes, methods, tools and inspirational examples/outcomes from disparate sources and, in doing so, will create a specific canon of work to illuminate contemporary design discourse.Design Activism reveals the power of design for positive social and environmental change, design with a central activist role in the sustainability challenge. Inspired by past design activists and set against the context of global-local tensions, expressions of design activism are mapped. The nature of contemporary design activism is explored, from individual/collective action to the infrastructure that supports it generating powerful participatory design approaches, a diverse toolbox and inspirational outcomes. This is design as a political and social act, design to enable adaptive societal capacity for co-futuring.
SituationClaire Doherty
The MIT Press, 2009
Situation—a unique set of conditions produced in both space and time and ranging across material, social, political, and economic relations—has become a key concept in twenty-first-century art. Rooted in artistic practices of the 1960s and 1970s, the idea of situation has evolved and transcended these in the current context of globalization. This anthology offers key writings on areas of art practice and theory related to situation, including notions of the site specific, the artist as ethnographer or fieldworker, the relation between action and public space, the meaning of place and locality, and the crucial role of the curator in recent situation specific art.
In North America and Europe, the site-specific is often viewed in terms of resistance to art's commoditization, while elsewhere situation-specific practices have defied institutions of authority. The contributors discuss these recent tendencies in the context of proliferating international biennial exhibitions, curatorial place-bound projects, and strategies by which artists increasingly unsettle the definition and legitimation of situation-based art.
Michele Oka Doner : bronze, clay, porcelain, and works on paper
Marlborough Chelsea, c2008.
Arshile Gorky : a retrospective
Michael R. Taylor
Yale University Press, c2009
No hair day : a collaboration
Elsa Dorfman ; movie stills by Bob Burns
www.elsa.photo.net, c2003
Broken brushes : German art from the Kaiser to Hitler : works on paper from the Kopriva collection = Pinceles quebrados : arte aleman, del Kaiser a Hitler.
Redbud Gallery, c2006
