Essays, dialogues, and art projects that illuminate the changing role of art as it responds to radical economic, political, and global shifts.
How should we understand the purpose of publicly engaged art in the twenty-first century, when the very term "public art" is largely insufficient to describe such practices?
Concepts such as "new genre public art," "social practice," or "socially engaged art" may imply a synergy between the role of art and the role of government in providing social services. Yet the arts and social services differ crucially in terms of their methods and metrics. Socially engaged artists need not be aligned (and may often be opposed) to the public sector and to institutionalized systems. In many countries, structures of democratic governance and public responsibility are shifting, eroding, and being remade in profound ways-driven by radical economic, political, and global forces. According to what terms and through what means can art engage with these changes?
This volume gathers essays, dialogues, and art projects-some previously published and some newly commissioned-to illuminate the ways the arts shape and reshape a rapidly changing social and governmental landscape. An artist portfolio section presents original statements and projects by some of the key figures grappling with these ideas.
Essays, dialogues, and art projects that illuminate the changing role of art as it responds to radical economic, political, and global shifts.
How should we understand the purpose of publicly engaged art in the twenty-first century, when the very term "public art" is largely insufficient to describe such practices?
Concepts such as "new genre public art," "social practice," or "socially engaged art" may imply a synergy between the role of art and the role of government in providing social services. Yet the arts and social services differ crucially in terms of their methods and metrics. Socially engaged artists need not be aligned (and may often be opposed) to the public sector and to institutionalized systems. In many countries, structures of democratic governance and public responsibility are shifting, eroding, and being remade in profound ways-driven by radical economic, political, and global forces. According to what terms and through what means can art engage with these changes?
This volume gathers essays, dialogues, and art projects-some previously published and some newly commissioned-to illuminate the ways the arts shape and reshape a rapidly changing social and governmental landscape. An artist portfolio section presents original statements and projects by some of the key figures grappling with these ideas.
Public Servants boldly reaffirms the necessity of talking about art and politics together. In it, everything we thought we knew about both becomes questionable. This bracing, passionate, thrilling collection shakes it all up and goes after the cliches and the taboos with unrelenting fervor. It doesn't tell us what to do, but it will certainly help us to figure that out for ourselves. -- Thomas Keenan, Human Rights Project, Bard College Extraordinary in its range and depth, Public Servants is an essential volume. It rigorously unpacks the intersectional, aesthetic, and real possibilities for art and culture to confront the social, economic, and environmental challenges of a globalized world. -- Laura Raicovich, President and Director, Queens Museum Encompassing sections on labor, the economy, biopolitics, education, and security, this anthology tackles urgent topics like the effectiveness of socially engaged art and offers readers an in-depth and critical understanding around artwork and ways of thinking too often simplified as 'social practice.' -- Saskia Bos, curator, art historian, and former Dean of The School of Art at The Cooper Union, New York
Johanna Burton is Keith Haring Director and Curator of Education
and Public Engagement at the New Museum in New York and the series
editor for the Critical Anthologies in Art and Culture.
Shannon Jackson is Associate Vice Chancellor of the Arts and Design
and the Cyrus and Michelle Hadidi Professor at the University of
California, Berkeley. Her publications include Social Works-
Performing Art, Supporting Publics.
Dominic Willsdon is Leanne and George Roberts Curator of Education
and Public Practice at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. His
publications include Public Intimacy- Art and Other Ordinary Acts
in South Africa.
Johanna Burton is Keith Haring Director and Curator of Education
and Public Engagement at the New Museum in New York and the series
editor for the Critical Anthologies in Art and Culture.
Shannon Jackson is Associate Vice Chancellor of the Arts and Design
and the Cyrus and Michelle Hadidi Professor at the University of
California, Berkeley. Her publications include Social Works-
Performing Art, Supporting Publics.
Dominic Willsdon is Leanne and George Roberts Curator of Education
and Public Practice at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. His
publications include Public Intimacy- Art and Other Ordinary Acts
in South Africa.
Eyal Weizman is Professor of Spatial and Visual Cultures at
Goldsmiths College, University of London and a Global Scholar at
Princeton University. A founder of Forensic Architecture, he is
also a founding member of the architectural collective DAAR in Beit
Sahour/Palestine. His books include Mengele's Skull, The Least of
All Possible Evils, and Hollow Land.
Devin Fore is Associate Professor in the Department of German at
Princeton University.
Wendy Brown is Class of 1936 First Chair of Political Science at
the University of California, Berkeley, where she is also
affiliated with the Department of Rhetoric and the Critical Theory
Program and the author of Undoing the Demos- Neoliberalism's
Stealth Revolution (Zone Books).
Johanna Burton is Keith Haring Director and Curator of Education
and Public Engagement at the New Museum in New York and the series
editor for the Critical Anthologies in Art and Culture.
T. J. Demos, an award-winning writer, is Professor of Visual
Culture at the University of California, Santa Cruz and Director of
its Center for Creative Ecologies. He writes widely about
contemporary art, global politics, and ecology, and is the author,
most recently, of Against the Anthropocene- Visual Culture and
Environment Today (Sternberg Press).
Carrie Lambert-Beatty is Assistant Professor in the Department of
History of Art and Architecture and the Department of Visual and
Environmental Studies at Harvard University.
Tom Finkelpearl is Program Director of PS 1 Contemporary Art Center
in New York City. From 1990 to 1996, he was Director of New York
City's Percent for Art Program.
Shannon Jackson is Associate Vice Chancellor of the Arts and Design
and the Cyrus and Michelle Hadidi Professor at the University of
California, Berkeley. Her publications include Social Works-
Performing Art, Supporting Publics.
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