Baroque Tendencies in Contemporary Art

Baroque Tendencies in Contemporary Art is a collection of essays by an international cadre of scholars addressing current trends within the field of contemporary art and how artists and architects reflect upon past traditions and fold them into the present. Often referred to as the Neo-Baroque, scholarship on this topic first emerged in the 1980s with the publication of several notable studies in France (but not translated into English until the 1990s); in addition, a number of recent exhibitions have focused on contemporary responses to the Baroque. The Baroque and the Neo-Baroque are frequently defined as having a propensity for instability, seriality, reflexivity, fluidity, and spectacle. This is perhaps partly why, in the millennial period, there is so much interest in the Baroque-we are seeking ways to find parallels between the art of then and the art of our own diverse, pluralistic culture. This book provides context for how contemporary artists meet and deal with the Baroque both formally and conceptually. Among others, it provides discussions of the work of American artists John Currin, Jeff Koons, Frank Stella, Lisa Yuskavage; American architect, Frank Gehry; European artists Lucian Freud, Jenny Saville, Emilio Vedova; Latin American artists Monica Castillo, Raphael Cauduro, Yishai Judisman; and New Zealand artists, Richard Reddaway and Joanna Langford.