New Books in Art

Martha J. Cutter, “The Illustrated Slave: Empathy, Graphic Narratives, and the Visual Culture of the Transatlantic Abolition Movement, 1800-1853” (U. Georgia Press, 2017)

19 Oct 2017

Contributed by Lukas

Slavery as a system of torture and bondage has fascinated the optical imagination of the transatlantic world for centuries. Scholars have examined var...

Marion Deshmukh, “Max Liebermann: Modern Art and Modern Germany” (Routledge, 2015)

17 Oct 2017

Contributed by Lukas

In her new book, Max Liebermann: Modern Art and Modern Germany (Routledge 2015), Marion Deshmukh, the Robert T. Hawkes Professor of History Emeritus a...

Robert W. Cherny, “Victor Arnautoff and the Politics of Art” (U. Illinois Press, 2017)

04 Oct 2017

Contributed by Lukas

Best remembered today for his work as a muralist, the Russian-American artist Victor Arnautoff lived a life worthy of Hollywood. In Victor Arnautoff a...

Lauren Lessing, et.al., “A Usable Past: American Folk Art at the Colby College Museum of Art”(Colby College Museum of Art, 2016)

15 Aug 2017

Contributed by Lukas

A Usable Past: American Folk Art at the Colby College Museum of Art (Colby College Museum of Art, 2016) is a contemporary analysis of paintings, works...

Donna M. Cassidy, Elizabeth Finch, and Randall R. Griffey, “Marsden Hartley’s Maine” (Yale UP, 2017)

28 Jul 2017

Contributed by Lukas

Marsden Hartley’s Maine (Yale University Press, 2017), published to accompany a major exhibition of his work organized by The Metropolitan Museum of...

Laura Larson, “Hidden Mother” (Saint Lucy Press, 2017)

20 Jul 2017

Contributed by Lukas

Hidden Mother by Laura Larson was published by Saint Lucy Press (January 2017), with 96 pages and 26 Color and black and white images. Hidden Mother ...

Dana Mills, “Dance and Politics: Moving Beyond Boundaries” (Manchester University Press, 2017)

10 Jul 2017

Contributed by Lukas

Dance & Politics: Moving Beyond Boundaries (Manchester University Press, 2017) by Dana Mills, considers dance as a political expression from a number ...

Jeanine Michna-Bales, “Through Darkness to Light: Photographs Along the Underground Railroad” (Princeton Architectural Press, 2017)

23 Jun 2017

Contributed by Lukas

When the Sun comes back And the first quail calls Follow the Drinkin’ Gourd. For the old man is a-waiting for to carry you to freedom If you fol...

David J. Carol, “No Plan B” (Peanut Press, 2017)

21 Jun 2017

Contributed by Lukas

No Plan B by David J. Carol was published by Peanut Press Books in 2017. The book is a retrospective of David’s work with 32 black and white images ...

Gillian McIver, “Art History for Filmmakers: The Art of Visual Storytelling” (Bloomsbury, 2016)

14 Jun 2017

Contributed by Lukas

Gillian McIver‘s Art History for Filmmakers: The Art of Visual Storytelling (Bloomsbury, 2016) is a ground-breaking book that illustrates the relati...

Paul Youngquist, “A Pure Solar World: Sun Ra and the Birth of Afrofuturism” (U. Texas Press, 2016)

27 May 2017

Contributed by Lukas

The legendary band leader Sun Ra said he came from Saturn. Known on Earth for his inventive music and extravagant stage shows, he pioneered free-form ...

Adair Rounthwaite, “Asking the Audience: Participatory Art in 1980s New York” (U. Minnesota Press, 2017)

23 May 2017

Contributed by Lukas

In Asking the Audience: Participatory Art in 1980s New York (University of Minnesota Press, 2017) Adair Rounthwaite examines the roles of artist, audi...

Discussion with George White, President of Up With Paper/Jumping Jack Press (Bologna Book Fair, 2017)

23 May 2017

Contributed by Lukas

George White, President and COO of Up With Paper and Jumping Jack Press interviewed following the Bologna Children’s Book Fair, discusses the intric...

Amy Elkins, “Black is the Day, Black is the Night” (Self Published, 2016)

22 May 2017

Contributed by Lukas

Black is the Day, Black is the Night by Amy Elkins is self-published (2016), with an essay by Gregory J. Harris and C.F., unpaged, 80 color and black-...

Matteo Faglia, “Pop-Up Show: The Magic Inside Books” (Bologna Children’s Book Fair Exhibition, 2017)

21 May 2017

Contributed by Lukas

Matteo Faglia, discusses the 2017 Bologna Book Fair exhibition, “Pop-up Show: The Magic Inside Books,” which traces some of the important mileston...

Dorothy Ko, “The Social Life of Inkstones: Artisans and Scholars in Early Qing China” (U. of Washington Press, 2017)

18 May 2017

Contributed by Lukas

Dorothy Ko‘s new book is a must-read. Troubling the hierarchy of head over hands and the propensity to denigrate craftsmen in Chinese history, The S...

Mark Alice Durant, “27 Contexts – An Anecdotal History in Photography” (Saint Lucy Books, 2017)

26 Apr 2017

Contributed by Lukas

27 Contexts –An Anecdotal History in Photography by Mark Alice Durant was published by Saint Lucy Books (January, 2017) with 288 pages and 90 Color ...

Benjamin Fondane, “Existential Monday” (NYRB Classics, 2016)

07 Apr 2017

Contributed by Lukas

Benjamin Fondane, a Franco-Romanian writer and contributor to the development of existential philosophy in the 1930s and 40s, is in the process of bei...

Ruth Beckford and Careth Reid, “The Picture Man: From the Collection of Bay Area Photographer E. F. Joseph” (Arcadia, 2017)

30 Mar 2017

Contributed by Lukas

From 1927 until his death in 1979, E.F. Joseph documented the daily lives of African Americans in the Bay Area. His images were printed in the Pittsbu...

Andrew Causey, “Drawn to See: Drawing as Ethnographic Method” (U. Toronto Press, 2016)

27 Mar 2017

Contributed by Lukas

In his new book Drawn to See: Drawing as an Ethnographic Method (University of Toronto Press, 2016) Andrew Causey argues that social science practitio...

Karl Baden, “The Americans by Car” (Retroactive Press, 2016)

25 Mar 2017

Contributed by Lukas

The Americans by Car is Karl Baden’s latest book. An homage to Robert Frank’s The Americans and Lee Friedlander’s America by Car, Baden’s book...

Christopher Pizzino, “Arresting Development: Comics at the Boundaries of Literature” (U of Texas Press, 2016)

19 Mar 2017

Contributed by Lukas

There’s a common myth about the history of comic books and strips. It’s the idea that the medium languished for decades as a sort of time-wasting ...

Damion Searls, “The Inkblots: Hermann Rorschach, His Iconic Test, and the Power of Seeing” (Crown, 2017)

07 Mar 2017

Contributed by Lukas

In his new book The Inkblots: Hermann Rorschach, His Iconic Test, and The Power of Seeing (Crown, 2017), Damion Searls presents the first biography of...

Paul LeValley, “Art Follows Nature: A Worldwide History of the Nude” (Edition One Books, 2016)

07 Mar 2017

Contributed by Lukas

Paul LeValley’s Art Follows Nature: A Worldwide History of the Nude (Edition One Books, 2016) is the first comprehensive study of the nude in art fr...

Elana Shapira, “Style and Seduction: Jewish Patrons, Architecture, and Design in Fin de Siecle Vienna” (Brandeis UP, 2016)

02 Mar 2017

Contributed by Lukas

In Style and Seduction: Jewish Patrons, Architecture, and Design in Fin de Siecle Vienna (Brandeis University Press, 2016), Elana Shapira, Lecturer at...

Daniel Magaziner, “The Art of Life in South Africa” (Ohio University Press, 2016)

17 Feb 2017

Contributed by Lukas

Daniel Magaziner’s latest book, The Art of Life in South Africa (Ohio University Press, 2016, and UKZN Press, 2017), is a welcome addition to the in...

Daniel W. Coburn, “The Hereditary Estate” (Kehrer Verlag, 2015)

13 Feb 2017

Contributed by Lukas

The Hereditary Estate by Daniel W. Coburn, is published by Kehrer Verlag (2015), with an essay by Karen Irvine, Curator and Associate Director at the ...

David Shafer, “Antonin Artaud” (Reaktion/U Chicago Press, 2016)

04 Jan 2017

Contributed by Lukas

“Artaud lived with his neck placed firmly in the noose.” -Bauhaus* David Shafer’s new biography, Antonin Artaud (Reaktion Books and the Univer...

Leon Borensztein, “Sharon” (Kehrer Verlag, 2016)

23 Dec 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Photographer Leon Borensztein began Sharon (Kehrer Verlag, 2016), his most personal project, thirty years ago when his daughter was born: “Throughou...

Amy Von Lintel, “Georgia O’Keeffe: Watercolors, 1916-1918” (Radius, 2016)

17 Dec 2016

Contributed by Lukas

In “Georgia O’Keeffe: At Home in the Wonderful Nothing,” a text accompanying the exhibition catalogue Georgia O’Keeffe: Watercolors 1916-1918 ...

Paul Benneworth et al., “The Impact and Future of Arts and Humanities Research” (Palgrave, 2016)

13 Dec 2016

Contributed by Lukas

What is the future for Arts and Humanities in Europe? The podcast discusses these questions with Paul Benneworth, one of the authors, along with Magnu...

Amani Willett, “Amani Willett: Disquiet” (Damiani Factory, 2013)

10 Dec 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Amani Willett: Disquiet by Amani Willett, is published by Damiani Factory (2013), with an afterward by Marvin Heiferman, 128 pages. “Disquiet’s ci...

Darcy Grimaldo Grigsby, “Enduring Truths: Sojourner’s Shadows and Substance” (U. of Chicago Press, 2015)

29 Nov 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Runaway slave Sojourner Truth gained fame in the nineteenth century as an abolitionist, feminist, and orator and earned a living partly by selling pho...

Scot McKendrick and Kathleen Doyle, “The Art of the Bible: Illuminated Manuscripts from the Medieval World” (Thames and Hudson, 2016)

28 Nov 2016

Contributed by Lukas

On today’s program, I talk with Scot McKendrick and Kathleen Doyle about their new book, The Art of the Bible Illuminated Manuscripts from the Medie...

Federica Goffi, “Time Matter(s): Invention and Reimagination in Built Conservation” (Routledge, 2013)

23 Nov 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Assistant Professor Federica Goffi fills a blind spot in current architectural theory and practice with this book, Time Matter(s): Invention and Re-Im...

Byrd Williams, “Proof: Photographs from Four Generations of a Texas Family” (U. of North Texas Press, 2016)

19 Nov 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Proof: Photographs from Four Generations of a Texas Family by Byrd Williams, with text by Byrd Williams IV, forward by Roy Flukinger and afterword by ...

Kirsty Sedgman, “Locating the Audience: How People Found Value in National Theatre Wales” (Intellect Books 2016)

19 Nov 2016

Contributed by Lukas

The value of the arts is a constant and vital question in contemporary culture. In Locating the Audience: How People Found Value in National Theatre W...

Paul C. Taylor, “Black is Beautiful: A Philosophy of Black Aesthetics” (Wiley Blackwell, 2016)

15 Nov 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Why is it controversial to cast light-skinned actress Zoe Saldana as the lead character in a film about the performer Nina Simone? How should we under...

Robert Brain, “The Pulse of Modernism: Physiological Aesthetics in Fin-de-Siecle Europe (U. of Washington Press, 2015)

12 Nov 2016

Contributed by Lukas

“Life imitates Art far more than Art imitates Life,” Oscar Wilde famously observed. Wilde’s waning romanticism can be read in stark contrast wit...

April Dammann, “Corita Kent: Art and Soul: The Biography” (Angel City Press, 2015)

21 Oct 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Sister Mary Corita, IHM (1918-1986), was a beloved artist and teacher whose role as the rebel nun continues to inspire contemporary audiences. Corita ...

Stephen Dupont, “Piksa Niugini” (Peabody Press/Radius Books, 2013)

18 Oct 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Piksa Niugini by Stephen Dupont, with forward by Robert Gardner and essay by Bob Connolly, is published by the Peabody Press and Radius Books, (2013)....

Stevphen Shukaitis, “The Composition of Movements to Come: Aesthetics and Cultural Labor after the Avant-Garde” (Rowman and Littlefield, 2016)

05 Oct 2016

Contributed by Lukas

How is the notion of the avant-garde in art relevant today? What can contemporary social movements learn from the Situationists? What is the meaning o...

Robert Herman, “The New Yorkers” (Proof Positive Press, 2015)

30 Sep 2016

Contributed by Lukas

The New Yorkers by Robert Herman, with an introduction by Sean Corcoran, Curator of Prints and Photographs at the City Museum of New York, is publishe...

E.R. Truitt, “Medieval Robots: Mechanism, Magic, Nature, and Art” (U. of Pennsylvania Press, 2015)

21 Sep 2016

Contributed by Lukas

“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” Clarke’s third law, coined in 1973, expresses the difficulty that peopl...

Jade Doskow, “Lost Utopias” (Black Dog Publishing, 2016)

21 Sep 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Since 2007, American photographer Jade Doskow has been documenting the remains of World’s Fair sites, once iconic global attractions that have often...

Alfred S. Posamentier and Robert Geretschlager, “The Circle: A Mathematical Exploration Beyond the Line” (Prometheus Books, 2016)

11 Sep 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Alfred S. Posamentier and Robert Geretschlager, The Circle: A Mathematical Exploration Beyond the Line (Prometheus Books, 2016) goes considerably beyo...

Miki Kratsman with Ariella Azoulay, “The Resolution of the Suspect” (Radius Books, 2016)

30 Aug 2016

Contributed by Lukas

The Resolution of the Suspect by Israeli photographer Miki Kratsman, with text by Ariella Azoulay, is co-published by the Peabody Museum Press at Harv...

Stephen Lee Naish, “Create or Die: Essays on the Artistry of Dennis Hopper” (Amsterdam UP, 2016)

24 Aug 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Stephen Lee Naish first became aware of Dennis Hopper watching David Lynch’s Blue Velvet, jumpstarting what would become a long examination of Hoppe...

Silvia Jonas, “Ineffability and Its Metaphysics: The Unspeakable in Art, Religion, and Philosophy” (Palgrave Macmillan, 2016)

15 Aug 2016

Contributed by Lukas

There is a long history in philosophy, art and religion of claims about the ineffable from The One in Plotinus to Kant’s noumena or thing-in-itself ...

Morgan Pitelka, “Spectacular Accumulation: Material Culture, Tokugawa Ieyasu, and Samurai Sociability” (U. of Hawaii Press, 2016)

10 Aug 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Morgan Pitelka’s new book looks closely at the material culture of the Three Unifiers of the late sixteenth century in Japan– Oda Nobunaga, Toyoto...

Rachel Price, “Planet/Cuba: Art, Culture and the Future of the Island” (Verso, 2015)

02 Aug 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Cuban artists have been very productive this past decade, producing stunning and surprising works against a backdrop of political and economic transfo...

Paul Roquet, “Ambient Media: Japanese Atmospheres of Self” (U. of Minnesota Press, 2016)

31 Jul 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Paul Roquet’s wonderful new book begins with an offering of jellyfish and proceeds to teach us how to read the air. Ambient Media: Japanese Atmosphe...

Diana L. Linden, “Ben Shahn’s New Deal Murals: Jewish Identity in the American Scene” (Wayne State UP, 2015)

28 Jul 2016

Contributed by Lukas

In Ben Shahn’s New Deal Murals: Jewish Identity in the American Scene (Wayne State University Press, 2015), Diana L. Linden, an art historian of Ame...

Susan Cahan, “Mounting Frustration: The Art Museum in the Age of Black Power” (Duke UP, 2016)

21 Jul 2016

Contributed by Lukas

The struggle for representation within the art museum is the focus of a timely and important new book by Susan Cahan, Associate Dean for the Arts at Y...

Kevin Bubriski, “Look into My Eyes: Nuevomexicanos por Vida, ’81-’83” (Museum of New Mexico Press, 2016)

10 Jul 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Kevin Bubriski, a New Englander and internationally acclaimed photographer, was a freelance photojournalist when he first arrived in New Mexico in 198...

Brent Walker, “The Hidden South–Come Home” (Beaver’s Pond Press, 2016)

01 Jul 2016

Contributed by Lukas

The Hidden South–Come Home (Beaver’s Pond Press, 2016) is the result of an ongoing project that documents intimate stories of people who are often...

Sandow Birk, “American Qur’an” (Liveright, 2015)

15 Jun 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Could the Qur’an–understood, according to Muslims, as the verbatim word of God in Arabic–acquire a nationality? Specifically, could it be Americ...

John Brian King, “Nude Reagan” (Spurl Editions, 2016)

13 Jun 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Nude Reagan (Spurl Editions, 2016) is John Brian King’s second book of photography. His first book, LAX: Photographs of Los Angeles 1980-84, was pub...

Ken Light, “Whats Going On? 1969 -1974” (Lighted Square Media, 2015)

20 May 2016

Contributed by Lukas

What’s Going On? 1969 -1974 (Lighted Square Media, 2015) is Ken Light‘s ninth book. Ken started his professional life as a photojournalist at his ...

Stern, et al., “The Monk’s Haggadah: A Fifteenth-Century Illuminated Codex from the Monastery of Tegernsee” (Penn State UP, 2015)

20 Apr 2016

Contributed by Lukas

The Monk’s Haggadah: A Fifteenth-Century Illuminated Codex from the Monastery of Tegernsee (Penn State UP, 2015) is unique. The book, edited by Davi...

Pamela D. Winfield, “Icons and Iconoclasm in Japanese Buddhism: Kukai and Dogen on the Art of Enlightenment” (Oxford UP, 2013)

29 Mar 2016

Contributed by Lukas

What role do images play in the enlightenment experience? Can Buddha images, calligraphy, mandalas, and portraits function as nodes of access for a pr...

Tahneer Oksman, “How Come Boys Get to Keep Their Noses?” (Columbia UP, 2016)

24 Mar 2016

Contributed by Lukas

In “How Come Boys Get to Keep Their Noses?”: Women and Jewish American Identity in Contemporary Graphic Memoirs (Columbia University Press, 2016)...

Eubanks, Abel and Chen, eds., “Verge: Studies in Global Asias 1.2: Collecting Asias” (U of Minnesota Press, 2015)

18 Mar 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Verge: Studies in Global Asias is an inspiring and path-breaking new journal that explores innovative forms for individual and collaborative scholarly...

Hillary Chute, “Disaster Drawn: Visual Witness, Comics, and Documentary Form” (Harvard UP, 2016)

14 Mar 2016

Contributed by Lukas

In her new book Disaster Drawn: Visual Witness, Comics, and Documentary Form (Harvard UP, 2016), Hillary Chute analyses the documentary power in the...

Krista A. Thompson, “Shine: The Visual Economy of Light in African Diasporic Aesthetic Practice” (Duke UP, 2015)

04 Mar 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Shine: The Visual Economy of Light in African Diasporic Aesthetic Practice (Duke University Press, 2015) is a gorgeous book. It’s about light and th...

Kishwar Rizvi, “The Transnational Mosque: Architecture and Historical Memory in the Contemporary Middle East” (UNC Press, 2015)

08 Feb 2016

Contributed by Lukas

In her excellent new book The Transnational Mosque: Architecture and Historical Memory in the Contemporary Middle East (UNC Press, 2015), Kishwar Rizv...

David Wright, “Understanding Cultural Taste: Sensation, Skill and Sensibility,” (Palgrave Macmillan, 2015)

03 Feb 2016

Contributed by Lukas

What is cultural taste? How is it formed, imagined and patterned? In Understanding Cultural Taste: Sensation, Skill and Sensibility (Palgrave MacMilla...

George Cotkin, “Feast of Excess: A Cultural History of the New Sensibility” (Oxford UP, 2015)

22 Jan 2016

Contributed by Lukas

George Cotkin is an emeritus professor of history at California Polytechnic State University. In his book Feast of Excess: A Cultural History of the N...

Lynn Gamwell, “Mathematics and Art: A Cultural History” (Princeton UP, 2015)

05 Jan 2016

Contributed by Lukas

Today I’m talking with Lynn Gamwell about Mathematics and Art: A Cultural History (Princeton University Press, 2015). This book is a breathtaking co...

Roberta Wue, “Art Worlds: Artists, Images, and Audiences in Late 19th-Century Shanghai” (U of Hawaii Press, 2014)

11 Dec 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Roberta Wue‘s new book brings readers into the world of late Qing Shanghai, a center of art, culture, and entertainment. As artists fled to the city...

Rebecca Gordon-Nesbitt, “To Defend the Revolution is to Defend Culture: The Cultural Policy of The Cuban Revolution” (PM Press, 2015)

01 Dec 2015

Contributed by Lukas

What are the alternatives to the current neo-liberal cultural settlement prevailing in much of the global north? In To Defend the Revolution is to Def...

Megan Prelinger, “Inside the Machine: Art and Invention in the Electronic Age” (Norton, 2015)

19 Nov 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Megan Prelinger‘s beautiful new book brings together the histories of technology and visuality to ask the question, “What cultural history of elec...

Ping Foong, “The Efficacious Landscape: On the Authorities of Painting at the Northern Song Court” (Harvard UP, 2015)

09 Nov 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Ink landscape painting was distinctive to the Song dynasty, and the Northern Song period was a special time for the medium. By the tenth century, this...

Paul Bonin-Rodriguez, “Performing Policy” (Palgrave, 2014)

20 Oct 2015

Contributed by Lukas

How has American cultural and artistic policy changed over the last 25 years? Performing Policy: How Contemporary Politics and Cultural Programmes Red...

Ilan Stavans and Jorge J. E. Garcia, “Thirteen Ways of Looking At Latino Art” (Duke UP, 2014)

30 Sep 2015

Contributed by Lukas

As demographic trends continue to mark the so-called “Latinization” of the U.S., pundits across various media outlets struggle to understand the e...

Darren Middleton, “Rastafari and the Arts: An Introduction” (Routledge, 2015)

31 Aug 2015

Contributed by Lukas

While many are familiar with the call for ‘One Love’ from the music of Bob Marley they more than likely know little about the tradition that this ...

Derek Sayer, “Prague, Capital of the Twentieth Century: A Surrealist History” (Princeton UP 2013)

24 Jul 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Prague, according to Derek Sayer, is the place “in which modernist dreams have time and again unraveled.” In this sweeping history of surrealism c...

Jonathan M. Reynolds, “Allegories of Time and Space: Japanese Identity in Photography and Architecture” (U of Hawaii Press, 2015)

24 Jul 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Jonathan M. Reynolds‘s new book looks carefully at how photographers, architects, and others wrestled with a postwar identity crisis as they explore...

Nick Sousanis, “Unflattening” (Harvard UP, 2015)

12 Jun 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Nick Sousanis‘s new book is a must-read for anyone interested in thinking or teaching about the relationships between text, image, visuality, and kn...

Meryle Secrest, “Elsa Schiaparelli: A Biography” (Knopf, 2014)

02 Jun 2015

Contributed by Lukas

As Meryle Secrest notes in the introduction to her new book, Elsa Schiaparelli: A Biography (Knopf, 2014),”The most extraordinary fashion designer o...

Greg Barnhisel, “Cold War Modernists: Art, Literature, and American Cultural Diplomacy” (Columbia UP, 2015)

02 Jun 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Greg Barnhisel‘s new book, Cold War Modernists: Art, Literature, and American Cultural Diplomacy (Columbia UP, 2015) examines how modernism was defa...

Magda Romanska, “The Post-Traumatic Theatre of Grotowski and Kantor” (Anthem Press, 2014)

02 Jun 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Jerzy Grotowsky and Tadeusz Kantor were influential in avant-garde theater in the West in the 1960s and 1970s, receiving high critical regard despite ...

John Sharp, “Works of Game: On the Aesthetics of Games and Art” (MIT Press, 2015)

01 Jun 2015

Contributed by Lukas

That games, particularly video games, could be viewed as art should come as no surprise. And yet, a debate exists over what is and should be considere...

Winnie Won Yin Wong, "Van Gogh on Demand: China and the Readymade" (U Chicago Press, 2014)

26 May 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Reading Winnie Wong's new book on image production in Dafen village will likely change the way you think about copying, China, and the relationship b...

Ritu G. Khanduri, “Caricaturing Culture in India: Cartoons and History in the Modern World” (Cambridge UP, 2014)

20 Apr 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Caricaturing Culture in India: Cartoons and History in the Modern World (Cambridge University Press, 2014) is a wonderful piece of visual anthropology...

Melissa Dabakis, “A Sisterhood of Sculptors: American Artists in Nineteenth-Century Rome (Penn State UP, 2014)

20 Apr 2015

Contributed by Lukas

In A Sisterhood of Sculptors: American Artists in Nineteenth-Century Rome (Penn State University Press, 2014), Melissa Dabakis takes readers on an un...

Kristina Kleutghen, “Imperial Illusions: Crossing Pictorial Boundaries in the Qing Palaces” (U of Washington Press, 2015)

20 Feb 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Kristina Kleutghen‘s beautiful new book offers a fascinating window into the culture of illusion in China in the eighteenth century and beyond. Impe...

Ann C. Pizzorusso, “Tweeting Da Vinci” (Da Vinci Press, 2014)

18 Feb 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Ann C. Pizzorusso‘s new book is a wonderfully creative and gorgeously illustrated meeting of geology, art history, and Renaissance studies. Arguing ...

Jen Harvie, “Fair Play: Art, Performance and Neoliberalism” (Palgrave, 2013)

09 Feb 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Arts and culture are under threat in the age of austerity. This threat is underpinned by the misuse of the idea of participation in contemporary perfo...

Steven Shaviro, “The Universe of Things: On Speculative Realism” (University of Minnesota Press, 2014)

16 Jan 2015

Contributed by Lukas

Steven Shaviro‘s new book is a wonderfully engaging study of speculative realism, new materialism, and the ways in which those fields can speak to a...

Gene Luen Yang, “Boxers & Saints” (First Second, 2013)

08 Jan 2015

Contributed by Lukas

I love picking up a historical monograph in which the footnotes count for a quarter or more of the total pages. Most students don’t share this stran...

Daniel Margocsy, “Commercial Visions: Science, Trade, and Visual Culture in the Dutch Golden Age” (University of Chicago Press, 2014)

09 Dec 2014

Contributed by Lukas

Daniel Margocsy‘s beautiful new book opens with a trip to Amsterdam by Baron Zacharias Conrad von Uffenbach, and closes with a shopping spree by Pet...

Carolyn L. Kane, “Chromatic Algorithms: Synthetic Color, Computer Art, and Aesthetics after Code” (U of Chicago Press, 2014)

03 Dec 2014

Contributed by Lukas

Carolyn L. Kane’s new book traces the modern history of digital color, focusing on the role of electronic color in computer art and media aesthetics...

Joan Kee, “Contemporary Korean Art: Tansaekhwa and the Urgency of Method” (University of Minnesota Press, 2013)

07 Nov 2014

Contributed by Lukas

Joan Kee‘s new book is a gorgeous and thoughtful introduction to the history of contemporary art in Korea. Contemporary Korean Art: Tansaekhwa and t...

Catherine W. Bishir, ‘Crafting Lives: African American Artisans in New Bern, North Carolina, 1770-1900’ (UNC Press, 2013)

28 Oct 2014

Contributed by Lukas

Seeking to fill the gap in scholarship focused on African American artisans in the American South, Catherine W. Bishir uses the very specific location...

Lara Jaishree Netting, “A Perpetual Fire: John C. Ferguson and His Quest for Chinese Art and Culture” (Hong Kong UP, 2013)

11 Sep 2014

Contributed by Lukas

Lara Netting’s new book explores the life, career, and work of one man as a window into the history and associated practices of “Chinese art” du...

James Nisbet, “Ecologies, Environments, and Energy Systems in Art of the 1960s and 1970s” (MIT Press, 2014)

10 Sep 2014

Contributed by Lukas

It is a rare event when a dissertation focused on a single work yields a rich and fruitful account of an entire period. James Nisbet‘s new book, whi...

Craig Clunas, “Screen of Kings: Royal Art and Power in Ming China” (University of Hawaii Press, 2013)

02 Jul 2014

Contributed by Lukas

Craig Clunas‘s new book explores the significance of members of the imperial clan, or “kings” in Ming China. A king was established in a “stat...

Omar W. Nasim, “Observing by Hand: Sketching the Nebulae in the Nineteenth Century” (University of Chicago Press, 2013)

02 Jun 2014

Contributed by Lukas

In Omar W. Nasim‘s new book, a series of fascinating characters sketch, paint, and etch their way toward a mapping of the cosmos and the human mind....

Matthew C. Hunter, “Wicked Intelligence” (University of Chicago Press, 2013)

23 Mar 2014

Contributed by Lukas

The pages of Matthew C. Hunter‘s wonderful new book are full of paper fish, comets, sleepy-eyed gazes, drunk ants, and a cast full of fascinating (a...