Living As Form

Product Description

Over the past twenty years an abundance of art forms have emerged that use aesthetics to affect social dynamics. These works are often produced by collectives or come out of a community context; they emphasize participation dialogue & action & appear in situations ranging from theater to activism to urban planning to visual art to health care. Engaged with the texture of living these art works often blur the line between art & life. This book offers the first global portrait of a complex & exciting mode of cultural production--one that has virtually redefined contemporary art practice. Living as Form grew out of a major exhibition at Creative Time in New York City. Like the exhibition the book is a landmark survey of more than 100 projects selected by a thirty-person curatorial advisory team; each project is documented by a selection of color images. The artists include the Danish collective Superflex who empower communities to challenge corporate interest; Turner Prize nominee Jeremy Deller creator of socially & politically charged performance works; Women on Waves who provide abortion services & information to women in regions where the procedure is illegal; & Santiago Cirugeda an architect who builds temporary structures to solve housing problems. Living as Form contains commissioned essays from noted critics & theorists who look at this phenomenon from a global perspective & broaden the range of what constitutes this form. Contributing authors Claire Bishop Carol Becker Teddy Cruz Brian Holmes Shannon Jackson Maria Lind Anne Pasternak Nato Thompson