A Companion To Contemporary Art Since 1945

• Collects 27 original essays by expert scholars describing the current state of scholarship in art history and visual studies, and pointing to future directions in the field.
  
• Contains dual chronological and thematic coverage of the major themes in the art of our time: politics, culture wars, public space, diaspora, the artist, identity politics, the body, and visual culture.
  
• Offers synthetic analysis, as well as new approaches to, debates central to the visual arts since 1945 such as those addressing formalism, the avant-garde, the role of the artist, technology and art, and the society of the spectacle.

Notes on Contributors.

Series Editor’s Preface.

Acknowledgments.

Part I: Introduction.

1. Writing Contemporary Art into History, a Paradox?: Amelia Jones (University of Manchester).

Part II: Decades.

1945-1960.

2. ‘America’ and its Discontents: Art and Politics 1945-1960: Gavin Butt (Goldsmiths College).

1960-1970.

3. ‘1960-1970’: A Decade Out-of-Bounds: Anna Dezeuze (University of Manchester).

1970-1980.

4. ‘I’m sort of sliding around in place… ummm…’: Art in the 1970s: Sam Gathercole (University of Essex).

1980-1990.

5. Pictures and Positions in the 1980s: Howard Singerman (University of Virginia).

1990-2004.

6. 1990-2004: In the Clutches of Time: Henry M. Sayre (Oregon State University).

Part III: Aesthetics.

Formalism.

7. Form and Formless: Caroline A. Jones (MIT).

Art as Idea.

8. Re-Thinking the ‘Duchamp Effect’: David Hopkins (University of Glasgow).

Beauty.

9. Regarding Beauty: Margaret Morgan.

Part IV: Politics.

Avant-Garde.

10. Avant-Garde: A Historiography of a Critical Concept: Johanne Lamoureux (Université de Montréal).

Activism.

11. Facture for Change: U.S. Activist Art since 1950: Jennifer González (University of California, Santa Cruz) and Adrienne Posner (University of California, Santa Cruz).

Culture Wars.

12. ‘The Senators Were Revolted’: Homophobia and the Culture Wars: Jonathan D. Katz (State University of New York at Stony.

Brook).

Art and Its Public(s).

13. Crowds and Connoisseurs: Art and the Public Sphere in America: Grant Kester (University of California, San Diego).

Part V: Identity/ Subjectivity.

The Artist.

14. The Writerly Artist: Beautiful, Boring and Blue: Carol Mavor (University of North Carolina).

Diaspora.

15. Diaspora: Multiple Practices, Multiple Worldviews: Steven Nelson (UCLA).

Feminism.

16.Power and Pleasure: Feminist Art Practice and Theory in the United States and Britain: Laura Meyer (California State University, Fresno).

Queer.

17. Queer Wallpaper: Jennifer Doyle (University of California, Riverside).

Race/ Ethnicity.

18. Ethnicity: Alternative Black Art theories in Contemporary Art: Pauline de Souza (University of East London).

Embodiment.

19. The Paradoxical Bodies of Contemporary Art: Christine Ross (McGill University).

Part VI: Methods/ Theories.

Marxism.

20. A Shadow of Marx: Neil Cummings (Chelsea College of Art and Design) and Marysia Lewandowska(Konstfack, Stockholm).

Poststructuralism.

21. Postructuralism and Contemporary Art, Past, Present, Future…:Sarah Wilson (University of London).

Postcolonial Theory.

22. ‘Fragments of Collapsing Space’: Postcolonial Theory and Contemporary Art.

Mark Crinson (University of Manchester).

Visual Culture.

23. Visual Culture Studies: Questions of History, Theory, and Practice: Marquard Smith (Kingston University).

Part VII: Technology.

Mass Culture, High/Low.

24. ‘That's All Folks’: Contemporary Art and Popular Culture: Nick Mirzoeff (New York University).

Photography/Index.

25. Image + Text: Reconsidering Photography in Contemporary Art: Liz Kotz (University of Minnesota).

Spectacle/Appropriation.

26. Imagine There’s No Image (It’s Easy If You Try): Appropriation in the Age of Digital Reproduction: Dore Bowen (California College of the Arts).

Digital Media.

27. ‘Life-like’: Historizing Process and Responsiveness in Digital Art: María Fernández (Cornell University).

Index