“Marvelously entertaining, exciting and informative.” —Guardian“An engaging and accessible history.” —New York Review of BooksThis group biography is “an exhilarating page-turner” and “outstanding critical introduction” to the work and legacy of the Frankfurt School, and the great 20th-century thinkers who created it (Washington Post).In 1923, a group of young radical German thinkers and in...

A Short History of StupidityWe are living, it is often said, in a golden age of stupidity, in which boneheaded, mendacious politicians get elected by voters who've become too mindless to realize their interests are ill served by narcissists, while vapid social media influencers corrupt their no less witless followers with groundless conspiracy theories and eye-wateringly foolish takedowns of scientific expertise. Our time, one might be forgiven for thinkin...

A radical new history of a dangerous ideaPost-Modernity is the creative destruction that has shattered our present times into fragments. It dynamited modernism which had dominated the western world for most of the 20th century. Post-modernism stood for everything modernism rejected: fun, exuberance, irresponsibility. But beneath its glitzy surface, post-modernism had a dirty secret: it was the fig leaf for a rapacious new kind of capitalism. It was also the forcing...

We are living, it is often said, in a golden age of stupidity, in which boneheaded, mendacious politicians get elected by voters who've become too mindless to realize their interests are ill served by narcissists, while vapid social media influencers corrupt their no less witless followers with groundless conspiracy theories and eye-wateringly foolish takedowns of scientific expertise. Our time, one might be forgiven for thinking, is one in which the fool's gold of stupidity has become a d...

Post-Modernity is the creative destruction that has shattered our present times into fragments. It dynamited modernism which had dominated the western world for most of the twentieth century. Post-modernism stood for everything modernism rejected: fun, exuberance, irresponsibility. But beneath its glitzy surface, post-modernism had a dirty secret: it was the fig leaf for a rapacious new kind of capitalism. It was also the forcing ground of the "post truth," by means of which western values...

An engaging account of today’s contemporary art world that features original articles by leading international art historians, critics, curators, and artists, introducing varied perspectives on the most important debates and discussions happening around the world.Features a collection of all-new essays, organized around fourteen specific themes, chosen to reflect the latest debates in contemporary art since 1989Each topic is prefaced by an introduction on current di...

Contemporary art is obsessed with the politics of identity. Visit any contemporary gallery, museum or theatre, and chances are the art on offer will be principally concerned with race, gender, sexuality, power and privilege.The quest for truth, freedom and the sacred has been thrust aside to make room for identity politics. Mystery, individuality and beauty are out; radical feminism, racial grievance and queer theory are in. The result is a drearily predictable culture and the narr...

9.5 Theses on Art and Class seeks to show how a clear understanding of class makes sense of what is at stake in a broad number of contemporary art's most persistent debates, from definitions of political art to the troubled status of "outsider" and street art to the question of how we maintain faith in art itself.Ben Davis currently lives and works in New York City where he is Executive Editor at Artinfo.

In a series of newly commissioned essays by both established and emerging scholars, Globalization and Contemporary Art probes the effects of internationalist culture and politics on art across a variety of media. Globalization and Contemporary Art is the first anthology to consider the role and impact of art and artist in an increasingly borderless world.First major anthology of essays concerned with the impact of globalization on contemporary artE...

'The Documentary Handbook is mandatory reading for those who want a critical understanding of the place of factual formats in today’s exploding television and media industry, as well as expert guidance in complex craft skills in order to fully participate. The practical advice and wisdom here is second to none.' – Tony Steyger, Principal Lecturer, Southampton Solent University, UKThe Documentary Handbook is a critical introductio...

“A nimble case for pretentiousness as a willingness to take risks.” —The New York Times Book Review Pretentiousness is for anyone who has braved being different, whether that’s making a stand against artistic consensus or running the gauntlet of the last bus home dressed differently from everyone else. Pretentiousness is an essential ingredient in pop music and high art. Why do we choose accusations of elitism over open-mindedness? What do our anxieties about “pretending” say about us? “Fo...

"The Authentocrats" claim to the be the new voice of common sense that speak for the common man and woman; right-wing, traditional and dangerous, Joe Kennedy argues that they are everything but what they purport to be.In contemporary Britain, a lot has been said about what it is that “real people” want politically. Forgotten by elites and sick of globalisation, so the story goes, they demand patriotism, respect for the military, assurances on defence, and controls on immigration. I...