Sticky Sublime - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 158115092X ISBN 13: 9781581150926

Publisher: Allworth Press / School of Visual Arts, 2001

Synopsis

An enthralling anthology of introspective thoughts from today's most highly esteemed artists, poets, and critics regarding the elusive subject of the contemporary Sublime.  A companion to the critically acclaimed Uncontrollable Beauty, Sticky Sublime pushes the polemic on beauty even further, speculating where the beautiful and the Sublime will be situated in our post-postmodern, new technology era. Readers will discover intriguing essays by such respected creators and critics as Harold Bloom, David Hickey, Barbara Maria Stafford, and Anthony Haden-Guest, many of which were composed exclusively for this extraordinary guide. Art history lovers, academics, and anyone else interested in art appreciation will be surprised and entertained by what these internationally acclaimed authors have to say on an idea that has captivated and tangled the minds of great thinkers for centuries.

About this title

From the Publisher

Leading Thinkers in Art and Art Criticism Revisit the Sublime in the Days of Internet and Cityscapes

One of the oldest aesthetic concepts, yet long neglected, the sublime’s return to contemporary aesthetic debate has stirred a strong sense of wonder, causing the art world to speculate about how the sublime reveals itself in today’s après-post, New Technology atmosphere. In STICKY SUBLIME, some of today’s most highly regarded critics, artists, and poets map out the new territory of a concept that is stickier than ever.

STICKY SUBLIME follows the critically acclaimed UNCONTROLLABLE BEAUTY and is the latest addition to the Aesthetics Today Series, co-published with the School of Visual Arts. Combining classic theory with current discourse, this timely collection of essays documents the intellectually and aesthetically vibrant journey of a concept that has captivated and engaged the minds of great thinkers for centuries. From its philosophical formation through Longinus, Burke and Kant and its almost religious veneration in the works of Wordsworth, Turner, and Friedrich to Barnett Newman’s famous statement about the abstract sublime, this unique volume will provide fuel for endless inspired debates. Whether experienced through the cell phone’s expansive space, or in the bottomless seas of the Internet, or standing beneath a giant puppy made from flowers---the new sublime is less pristine than its predecessors, and it plays off of culture rather than nature.

This thoughtful collection of essays will provoke and inspire academics and non-specialist readers alike.

Contributors include: Bill Beckley; Harold Bloom; Barbara Claire Freeman; Jeremy Gilbert-Rolfe; Anthony Haden-Guest; Jacques Henric; Dave Hickey; Donald Kuspit; Libby Lumpkin; Thomas McEvilley; Dennis Oppenheim; Carter Ratcliff; Rene Ricard; David Shapiro; Barbara Maria Stafford; Wendy Steiner; Wallace Stevens; Mark Van Proyen; Walt Whitman.

From the Inside Flap

“The essays collected in STICKY SUBLIME will re-establish the importance of the sublime. This magnificent book shows that serious historical reflection can guide and inspire present-day debate about the values of art.”
—David Carrier, author of The Aesthetics of Comics and 1999–2000 Getty Scholar

STICKY SUBLIME is the companion volume to the critically acclaimed UNCONTROLLABLE BEAUTY, the inaugural anthology of the Aesthetics Today series, copublished by Allworth Press and the School of Visual Arts. Here’s what critics are saying about this new vision of beauty:

“UNCONTROLLABLE BEAUTY seeks to examine the changing role of beauty in the twentieth century and give beauty a kind of critical makeover . . . Thus, while turning to Kant, Freud, John Ruskin, and even Dr. Seuss for inspiration, many of the writings offer beauty a fresh face, casting it as a healing, personal, unpredictable, ungovernable experience.—New York Times

“Artists are rebelling against the visual starkness and political agendas of art of the recent past, and are growing increasingly unafraid to discuss their work with words like “vibrancy,” “lushness,” even “glamour.” For them, beauty is definitely back in style . . . Many of today’s most articulate defenders of beauty are people like Hickey, Beckley, Schjeldahl. They reject what they call the strain of intolerance and aesthetic “puritanism” running through the art world.”—Christian Science Monitor

Edition details

• Publisher: Allworth Press / School of Visual Arts
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 158115092X
• ISBN 13: 9781581150926
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 265
• Editor: Beckley Bill