Postsensual Aesthetics

On the Logic of the Curatorial

James Voorhies

$59.99

Hardback

Not in-store but you can order this
How long will it take?

Availability Information

We source books from suppliers in Australia and overseas. For books we don't currently have in stock, the time it takes to get them from our suppliers can vary widely - from a few days to a few months - so we check each book with each supplier to determine the expected time it will take to be supplied to us.

We then advise you accordingly. If the time taken to get any book is too long for you, you can let us know and we will cancel or adjust your order, and refund as required.

To find out the anticipated arrival time for specific items prior to ordering, please contact us by phone or email:

Phone +61 2 9264 3111, or 1800 4 BOOKS (1800 4 26657) if outside Sydney:
option 1 Abbey's Bookshop (Crime, History, Science, Kids & more) • info@abbeys.com.au
option 2 Language Book Centre (ESL & Foreign Languages) • language@abbeys.com.au
option 3 Galaxy Bookshop (Sci-fi, Fantasy, Romance, Graphic Novels) • sf@galaxybooks.com.au

QTY:

English

MIT Press
28 March 2023

Theory of art

Contemporary art exhibitions appeal to cognition as well as the senses, modeling a new and expansive understanding of global aesthetics.

Contemporary art exhibitions appeal to cognition as well as the senses, modeling a new and expansive understanding of global aesthetics.

In this original work of aesthetic theory, James Voorhies argues that we live in the shadow of old ways of thinking about art that emphasize the immediate visual experience of an autonomous art object. But theory must change as artistic and curatorial production has changed. It should encompass the full range of activities through which we encounter art and exhibitions, in which reading and thinking are central to the aesthetic experience. Voorhies advances the theoretical framework of a ""postsensual aesthetics,"" which does not mean we are beyond a sensual engagement with objects, but rather embraces the cognitive connections with ideas that unite art and knowledge production. Cognitive engagements with art often begin with publications conceived as integral to exhibitions, conveying the knowledge and research artists and curators produce, and continuing in time and space beyond traditional curatorial frames. The idea, and not just visual immediacy, is now art's defining moment.

Voorhies reframes aesthetic criteria to account for the liminal, cognitive spaces inside and outside of the exhibition. Surveying a wide range of artists, curators, exhibitions, and related publications, he repositions the aesthetic theory of Theodor Adorno, and draws inspiration from Rosalind Krauss and Fredric Jameson, to describe a contemporary ""logic of the curatorial."" He demonstrates how, even as we increasingly expect to learn from contemporary art, we must avoid an instrumentalist and reductive view of art as a mere source of information. As Voorhies shows through an analysis of two major global exhibitions, dOCUMENTA (13) (artistic director Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev) and Documenta11 (artistic director Okwui Enwezor), and of Ute Meta Bauer's curatorial work at the Centre for Contemporary Art Singapore, it is imperative for artistic research to retain its unique role in the production of knowledge.

By: James Voorhies
Imprint: MIT Press
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 203mm, Width: 133mm,
Weight: 567g
ISBN: 9780262047609
ISBN 10: 0262047608
Pages: 152
Publication Date: 28 March 2023
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

Prelude The Research Exhibition 1 The Curatorial 6 Knowledge Production and Contemporary Art 10 Case Studies 15 Logic of the Curatorial 16 Reading through Adorno 18 Section 1 dOCUMENTA (13) A State of Mind 23 Learning from documenta 26 The Rise of the Contemporary Exhibition 28 Aesthetic Regimes of Art 33 A Kind of Fugitive Art 37 Artistic Research 45 The Follower: Later and Somewhere Else 49 Ideological Fissures 52 Logic of Disintegration 54 Interlude The Frankfurt School Contemporary 59 Autonomy According to Adorno 63 What Role Can Art Play? 69 Section 2 DOCUMENTA11 Curatorial Counterinsurgency 75 The Documenta11 Complexity 82 The Documenta11 Books 84 Curating Discourse 88 The Document of Maria Eichhorn Public Limited Company 92 The Prosthesis of Exhibition and the Power of the Curatorial 98 Section 3 CENTRE FOR CONTEMPORARY ART SINGAPORE Knowledge Economies 103 The Institution Object 108 The Making of an Institution 112 Learning to Unlearn 115 Exact Imagination 120 Acknowledgments 131 Notes 133

James Voorhies is an American curator and historian of modern and contemporary art. He has authored several books including Postsensual Aesthetics- On the Logic of the Curatorial (MIT Press, 2023) and Beyond Objecthood- The Exhibition as a Critical Form since 1968 (MIT Press, 2017); he is coeditor of a two-volume catalogue raisonne of the work of American artist Tony Smith, and editor of two companion volumes of essays and projects related to Smith (all MIT Press, 2024-2025).Voorhies is based New York, has taught at Bennington College and Harvard University, and holds a PhD in modern and contemporary art history from the Ohio State University, USA.