Books
The Anti-Spectacle of the Black Avant-Garde
Aliyyah Abdur-Rahman’s Millennial Style considers the political utility of Black abstraction and related forms to refute false narratives of progress.
Duke University Press
Books
Miami, Chonga Girls, and Claiming an Aesthetics of Excess
Author Jillian Hernandez theorizes the intersecting formations of gender, class, and race in relation to the self-presentation of Black and Latina women and girls.
Books
The Modernist Poet Who Took on Colonialism
Since Aimé Césaire’s death in 2008 at the age of 94, as democracies devolve into autocracies, his Discourse on Colonialism remains prescient about the barbarity that informs civilization.
Books
Keith Haring’s Lines of Desire
With his recent book, Ricardo Montez complicates notions of collaboration, refusing clean conclusions about Haring’s work and relationships.
Books
Lorraine O’Grady, in All of Her Literary Brilliance
The first book to offer a comprehensive overview of O’Grady’s writings, Writing in Space 1973 — 2019 affirms both the range and reach of the artist’s impact upon an art world that has only belatedly recognized her.
Books
Books About Pandemic and Contagion Free Online via Duke University Press
These books and articles deal with the most bedeviling questions that arise out of viral outbreaks, and offer intriguing studies by which we can chart a course toward health.
Books
A Tantalizing, If Flawed Reinterpretation of Picasso’s “Demoiselles d’Avignon”
In her new book, Suzanne Preston Blier seduces the reader with a reinterpretation of the painting, based on sources she claims no Picasso scholars have addressed before.
Books
How Surrealism’s Playful Aesthetic Was Deeply Political
The Surrealists’ insistence on irrationality was not a sport, but an attempt to engage in the political debates of their time.
Books
An Uncompromising Look at Photography and Gender
In Photography after Photography Abigail Solomon-Godeau’s overarching goal is to offer a feminist critique of the art world.
Books
The Modernists Marginalized Under Colonialism
Mapping Modernisms points us to the unequal way in which Western Modernist art histories characterize influence between cultures.
Books
An Art of Dislocation and Reinvention Reflects the Epic of Black America
Quite simply, the history, not just of art in Los Angeles, but of modern American art generally will have to be reconceived on the basis of Now Dig This!, the exhibition curated by Kellie Jones, and her new book, South of Pico.