Art Histories, Theories and Exceptions [Hardcover]

Our understanding of art has undergone several major upheavals in the past thirty years. Postmodernism and mass media began the process of disruption in the 1980s. The explosion in the use of digital technologies since the 1990s has radically altered the way in which art is now created, perceived and made available. The recent shift towards regarding art as part of a broader visual culture has torn art theory from its roots in art history and placed it in the context of anthropological, cultural and media theory.

Art: Histories, Theories and Exceptions confronts these different ideas by examining a range of different approaches to art - as ritual, as a form of diagrammatic writing, as a symptom of a cultural moment, as a commodity, and as an agent of change.

Art: Histories, Theories and Exceptions explores what art in its broadest sense - from Aboriginal work to the Western art market, from the role of museums to new media interactivity, from the mainstream to the radical - means today. This provocative book will be invaluable to students, practicing artists and general readers alike.

Chock-full of interesting bits of information, this primer to the art world covers much ground with agility. Artists interested in learning what they need to know to sound intelligent should start here. Each of the ten chapters is chronologically wide-ranging, an opportunity for digressions centered on vignettes about how works of art have been received.' Yet that is something of an understatement: this portrait of present habits of thought is itself provocative.Summing Up:Highly recommended. Upper-level undergraduates and above; general readers. CHOICE

Adam Geczy is one of the most gifted art writers in years. Thoughtfully, humorously, and with tremendous insight, he traverses a whole range of intellectual disciples to explore the uses and purposes of art and what distinguish it from other phenomena. An original book and highly readablels+