Schriftenreihe des Studienzentrums zur Moderne – Bibliothek Herzog Franz von Bayern am Zentralinstitut für Kunstgeschichte
Topics
Since the 1960s, artists have questioned the traditional idea of opposition between art and nature. They have incorporated animals and plants as co-actors in their work, and so established a sculptural aesthetic of the living, which called for a redefinition of the sculptural genre. This study is the first to examine so-called Non-Human Living Sculptures using the examples of Hans Haacke and Pierre Huyghe. Following a re-reading of the historiography of modernist sculpture, the author re-evaluates and expands on existing theories in individual work analyses. She shows how Haacke’s real-time systems, determined by US systems theory, biology and cybernetics, as well as his rejection of the object aesthetic have shaped contemporary positions such as Huyghe’s situational-aesthetic works.
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First comprehensive academic study of socalled Non-Human Living Sculptures
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Re-reading of the historiography of 20th century sculpture
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Sculptural aesthetics of the living
Digital technologies have profoundly impacted the arts and expanded the field of sculpture since the 1950s. Art history, however, continues to pay little attention to sculptural works that are conceived and ‘materialized’ using digital technologies. How can we rethink the artistic medium in relation to our technological present and its historical precursors? A number of theoretical approaches discuss the implications of the so-called ‘Aesthetics of the Digital’, referring, above all, to screen-based phenomena. For the first time, this publication brings together international and trans-historical research perspectives to explore how digital technologies re-configure the understanding of sculpture and the sculptural leading into the (post-)digital age.
- Up-to-date research on digital technologies’ expansion of the concept of sculpture
- Linking historical sculptural debates with discourse on the new media and (post-)digital culture
