A History of Visual Culture: Western Civilization from the 18th to the 21st Century

by Jane Kromm (Editor), Susan Benforado Bakewell (Editor)

Overview

A History of Visual Culture is a history of ideas. The recent explosion of interest in visual culture suggests the phenomenon is very recent. But visual culture has a history. Knowledge began to be systematically grounded in observation and display from the Enlightenment. Since then, from the age of industrialisation and colonialism to today's globalised world, visual culture has continued to shape our ways of thinking and of interpreting the world.

Carefully structured to cover a wide history and geography, A History of Visual Culture is divided into themed sections - Revolt and Revolution; Science and Empiricism; Gaze and Spectacle; Acquisition, Display, and Desire; Conquest, Colonialism, and Globalization; Image and Reality; Media and Visual Technologies. Each section presents a carefully selected range of case studies from across the last 250 years, designed to illustrate how all kinds of visual media have shaped our technology, aesthetics, politics and culture.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781845204921
Publisher:	Berg Publishers
Publication date:	12/01/2009
Pages:	480
Product dimensions:	7.40(w) x 9.50(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

Jane Kromm is Professor of Art History at Purchase College, State University of New York and author of The Art of Frenzy: Public Madness in the Visual Culture of Europe, 1500-1850.

Susan Benforado Bakewell is an independent curator and scholar, and has taught at the University of Texas, Arlington and Southern Methodist University. She is co-editor of Voices in New Mexico Art.

Table of Contents

General Introduction Jane Kromm 1

Part 1 Revolt and Revolution

Introduction Jane Kromm 14

1 The Politics of Visibility in Revolutionary France: Projecting on the Streets Helen Weston 18

2 Nineteenth-Century Revolutions and Strategies of Visual Persuasion Richard Taws 30

3 Socialist Movements and the Development of the Political Poster Elizabeth Guffey 42

4 Avant-Garde Art and the Culture of Protest: The Use-Value of Iconoclasm Jelena Stojanović 54

Part 2 Science and Empiricism

Introduction Jane Kromm 68

5 To Collect Is to Quantity and Describe: Visual Practices in the Development of Modern Science Jane Kromm 73

6 The Transparent Body: Biocultures of Evolution, Eugenics, and Scientific Racism Fae Brauer 89

7 Biology and Crime: Degeneracy and the Visual Trace Heather McPherson 104

8 Visual Models and Scientific Breakthroughs: The Virus and the Geodesic Dome: Pattern, Production, Abstraction, and the Ready-Made Model Nancy Anderson 117

Part 3 Gaze and Spectacle

Introduction Jane Kromm 132

9 Gaze, Body, and Sexuality: Modern Rituals of Looking and Being Looked At Temma Balducci 136

10 The Fl?neur/Fl?neuse Phenomenon Jane Kromm 147

11 Gaze and Spectacle in the Calibration of Class and Gender: Visual Culture in Vienna Elana Shapira 157

12 The Stigmata of Abjection: Degenerate Limbs, Hysterical Skin, and the Tattooed Body Fae Brauer 169

Part 4 Acquisition, Display, and Desire

Introduction Jane Kromm 186

13 To the Arcade: The World of the Shop and the Store Jane Kromm 190

14 "To See Is to Know:" Visual Knowledge at the International Expositions Amy F. Ogata 200

15 Changing Museum Spaces: From the Prado to the Guggenheim Bilbao Susan Benforado Bakewell 211

16 Design for Display Culture: Domestic Engineering to Design Research Michael J. Golec 224

Part 5 Conquest, Colonialism, and Globalization

Introduction Jane Kromm 238

17 Orientalism and Its Visual Regimes: Lovis Corinth and Imperialism in the Art of the Kaiserreich Matthew Potter 243

18 Marketing the Slave Trade: Slavery, Photography, and Emancipation: Time and Freedom in 'The Life of the Picture' Marcus Wood 255

19 Cultures of Confiscation: The Collection, Appropriation, and Destruction of South Asian Art Kimberly Masteller 267

20 Trading Cultures: The Boundary Issues of Globalization Nada Shabout 281

Part 6 Image and Reality

Introduction Jane Kromm 292

21 Multiples and Reproductions: Prints and Photographs in Nineteenth-Century England-Visual Communities, Cultures, and Class Joy Sperling 296

22 Inventing the Mise-en-Sc?ne: German Expressionism and the Silent Film Set Jane Kromm 309

23 The Reality of the Abstract Image: Rethinking Spirituality in Abstraction Sarah Warren 319

Part 7 Media and Visual Technologies

Introduction Jane Kromm 332

24 Now You See It: Disinformation and Disorientation on the Internet Brenda DeMartini-Squires 337

25 Carnival Mirrors: The Hermetic World of the Music Video M. Kathryn Shields 346

26 Digital Self-Fashioning in Cyberspace: The New Digital Self-Portrait Matt Ferranto 356

27 Feats of Simulation and the World of Video Games: Art, Cinema, and Interactivity Martin A. Danahay 367

28 What You See Is What You Get, or Reality Is What You Take from It Chris Kaczmarek 376

Contributors 385

List of Illustrations 389

Selected Bibliography 395

Index 399

Editorial Reviews

Overall, A History of Visual Culture is a solid introductory reader. The essays are short, assume no conversancy in social or media theory and consistently make use of fresh visual examples.
Art Libraries Journal

Solid, scholarly writing that would be suitable, in many cases revelatory, for students at any level of college as well as established art and art history scholars, curators and those in many other historical disciplines.
ARLIS (Arts Libraries Society of North America)

This is the only treatment of visual culture with a broad temporal reach across a range of Western art practices that emphasizes the historical specificity of the visual experience. The approach - to highlight the key themes in visual culture and to illustrate these themes chronologically through carefully chosen case studies - is very effective.
Kathleen Stewart Howe, Art and Art History, Pomona College, USA

From the Publisher

Overall, A History of Visual Culture is a solid introductory reader. The essays are short, assume no conversancy in social or media theory and consistently make use of fresh visual examples.

Art Libraries Journal Lee Sorensen (Duke University)