Surpassing the Spectacle: Global Transformations and the Changing Politics of Art

by Carol Becker

Overview

In her newest book, leading social critic Carol Becker offers a timely analysis of the nature of art and its role in politics and society. Completed just before the September 11, 2001 World Trade Center catastrophe, Surpassing the Spectacle is now especially relevant in its analysis of the spectacle society that was omnipresent before that fatal day. This book is remarkably prescient of the new concerns that have now become foremost in our thoughts since the attack. This collection of essays explores such topics as public memorials, America's attempt to hold onto a sense of security while faced with the reality of international terrorists living within our own cities, the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission, restorative justice, and issues of freedom of expression as they relate to incidents such as New York Mayor Guiliani's quest to ban Chris Ofili's painting of 'The Holy Virgin Mary' at the Brooklyn Museum. The essays cohere around Becker's central concerns: the education and role of artists in a post post-modern climate, controversies over public space, iconography, memorializing, and the myth of the global citizen. Throughout, Becker works to reconstruct a vision of humanity that incorporates, and hopefully moves us beyond, a dystopian moment when we no longer were able to use words such as humane, accountable, or the public good without seeming nostalgic and romantic. Becker raises the question of the place of art and the function of public intellectuals in a society desperately in need of creativity and leadership. The book is written in clear and accessible prose, which nonetheless looks at the issues philosophically and does not sacrifice any of the subtleties of thought necessary to contextualize and surpass the spectacle of contemporary U.S. society.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781461642749
Publisher:	Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Publication date:	12/17/2001
Series:	Culture and Politics Series
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	176
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

Carol Becker is dean of faculty and vice-president for academic affairs at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She is the author of Zones of Contention: Essays on Art, Institutions, Gender, and Anxiety (New York Press, 1996) and The Subversive Imagination: Artists, Society, and Social Responsibility(Routledge, 1994).

Table of Contents

Chapter 1 Introduction
Chapter 2 The Artist as Public Intellectual
Chapter 3 The Nature of the Investigation: Art Making in a Post-Postmodern Era
Chapter 4 The Art of Testimony
Chapter 5 Brooklyn Museum: Messing with the Sacred
Chapter 6 Betrayal
Chapter 7 Trial by Fire: A Saga of Gender and Leadership
Chapter 8 Reconciling Truth in South Africa
Chapter 9 Memory and Monstrosity
Chapter 10 The Second Johannesburg Biennale
Chapter 11 The Romance of Nomadism
Chapter 12 Art and Ecology
Chapter 13 GFP Bunny and the Plight of the Posthuman
Chapter 14 Surpassing the Spectacle
Chapter 15 Index

Editorial Reviews

Becker speaks with authority drawn in part from her 20-year association with the Art Institute of Chicago (she's dean of faculty and vice president for academic affairs)<-->on topics related to art and art education in the context of global society. She presents 13 essays, many developed from lectures presented over the last few years, on such topics as art-making in a postmodern era, the Brooklyn Museum<-->messing with the sacred, the romance of nomadism, and art and ecology, among other topics. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Booknews

This important collection by a leading public intellectual offers innumerable opportunities to think our way out of the paper bag so many Americans live in. With startling prescience, Carol Becker covers many issues that cultural workers need to confront, integrating familiar concepts into the larger picture. This compelling book is also the story of one woman's strength—and success—in the world of ideas. Read it, and think, then act.

Lucy R. Lippard

As dean of a major art school, Carol Becker speaks with unique authority and competence against a completely studio-based art education that only trains artists to become professionals within the confines of a circumscribed art world, rather than to see themselves as culural leaders and transformers, able to take on serious issues. This book belongs in the library of anyone who believes that art has a crucial and important role to play in the shaping of today's global society.

Suzi Gablik

In this passionate and fiercely engaged book, Carol Becker makes the case that without the ability of artists to speak the unspeakable and find form for the invisible, this country has no chance to resist the infantilizing seductiveness of spectacle and realize the radical potential of freedom.

Michael Brenson

As dean of a major art school, Carol Becker speaks with unique authority and competence against a completely studio-based art education that only trains artists to become professionals within the confines of a circumscribed art world, rather than to see themselves as culural leaders and transformers, able to take on serious issues. This book belongs in the library of anyone who believes that art has a crucial and important role to play in the shaping of today's global society.--Suzi Gablik, author of The Reenchantment of Art and Conversations Before the End of Time

In this passionate and fiercely engaged book, Carol Becker makes the case that without the ability of artists to speak the unspeakable and find form for the invisible, this country has no chance to resist the infantilizing seductiveness of spectacle and realize the radical potential of freedom.--Michael Brenson, author, Visionaries and Outcasts: The NEA, Congress, and the Place of the Visual Arts in America of the Visual Artist in Americ

This important collection by a leading public intellectual offers innumerable opportunities to think our way out of the paper bag so many Americans live in. With startling prescience, Carol Becker covers many issues that cultural workers need to confront, integrating familiar concepts into the larger picture. This compelling book is also the story of one woman's strength--and success--in the world of ideas. Read it, and think, then act.--Lucy R. Lippard, author of On the Beaten Track: Tourism, Art and Place

From the Publisher