Description
Book SynopsisI suggest that although at any given place and moment the aesthetic expressions of a political system just are that political system, the concepts are separable. Typically, aesthetic aspects of political systems shift in their meaning over time, or even are inverted or redeployed with an entirely transformed effect. You cannot understand politics without understanding the aesthetics of politics, but you cannot understand aesthetics as politics. The point is precisely to show the concrete nodes at which two distinct discourses coincide or connive, come apart or coalesce.from Political Aesthetics
Juxtaposing and connecting the art of states and the art of art historians with vernacular or popular arts such as reggae and hip-hop, Crispin Sartwell examines the reach and claims of political aesthetics. Most analysts focus on politics as discursive systems, privileging text and reducing other forms of expression to the merely illustrative. He suggests that we need to take mu
Trade Review
Political aesthetics, called into being by Crispin Sartwell, attends to the aestheticfeatures of political science, that is, such things as political systems, andconstitutions. Understanding politics, which is the place of power, of contestationbetween interests and interest groups, is incomplete without political aesthetics.
-- T. J. Diffey * Mind *
Sartwell proposes to expound and defend the bold and provocative view that although not all art is political, all politics is aesthetic.... Designed as an unconventional and unorthodox treatment of aesthetics and politics, this book is nicely written without too much jargon and enlivened by flashes of wit and insight.
* Choice *
Table of ContentsIntroduction: The Idea of Political Aesthetics1. Leni Riefenstahl Meets Charlie Chaplin: Aesthetics of the Third Reich2. Artphilosophical Themes3. Dead Kennedys and Black Flags: Artpolitics of Punk4. Prehistory of Political Aesthetics5. Red, Gold, Black, and Green: Black Nationalist Aesthetics6. Arthistorical Themes7. Political Power and Transcendental Geometry: Republican Classicism in Early AmericaConclusion: Political Styles and Aesthetic IdeologiesAppendix: Riffing on Political Aesthetics: Suggestions for Case Studies and ResearchReferences
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