Main entry:

Benjamin, Andrew E.

Title & Author:

Art, mimesis, and the avant-garde : aspects of a philosophy of difference / Andrew Benjamin.

Publication:

London ; New York : Routledge, 1991.

Description:

ix, 217 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm

Notes:
Includes bibliographical references (pages 213-214) and index.
Introduction: Inaugurating repetition -- 1. Interpreting reflections : painting mirrors -- 2. Spacing and distancing -- 3. Betraying faces : Lucian Freudʹs self-portraits -- 4. Present remembrance : Anselm Kieferʹs Iconoclastic controversy -- 5. Kitaj and the question of Jewish identity -- 6. Malevich and the avant-garde -- 7. Eisenman and the housing of tradition -- 8. Pluralism, the cosmopolitan and the avant-garde -- 9. The decline of art : Benjaminʹs aura -- 10. Tradition and experience : Walter Benjaminʹs "On some motifs in Baudelaire" -- 11. Descartesʹ fable : the Discours de la methode -- 12. The redemption of value : Laporte, writing as Abkurzung.

Summary:

Art, Mimesis and the Avant-Garde explores the relationship between art and philosophy. Andrew Benjamin argues for a reworking of the task of philosophy in terms of the centrality of ontology. It is in relation to this centrality, understood through the differences between modes of being, that art, mimesis, and the avant-garde come to be presented. A fundamental part of this book is the original interpretations of important contemporary painters and their themes: Lucian Freud's self-portraits, Francis Bacon's use of mirrors, R.B. Kitaj and Jewish identity, Anselm Kiefer and iconoclasm. Apart from painting, Benjamin considers architecture, literature, and the philosophical writings of Walter Benjamin and Descartes in elaborating the various aspects of ontological difference. Benjamin develops the theory of the avant-garde as a philosophical category rather than a historical marker, thus bringing the worlds of contemporary art criticism and contemporary philosophy closer together. -- Publisher description.

Resources:
Publisher description

ISBN:

0415060478 (hbk.)
9780415060479 (hbk.)
0415066271 (pbk.)
9780415066273 (pbk.)
9780203981450
0203981456

Subject:

Aesthetics.
Avant-garde (Aesthetics)
Mimesis in art.
Esthétique.
Avant-garde (Esthétique)
Mimêsis.
mimesis.
Avantgarde
Kunst
Mimesis
Ästhetik
Aufsatzsammlung
Esthetica.
Avant-garde.
Estetica (arte)
Mimesis in literature.

Form/genre:

Aufsatzsammlung.

Holdings:

Location: Library main 118785
Call No.: ID BH39.B3845; ID:96-B3568
Status: Available