Aesthetic Thinking: Essays on Intention, Painting, Action, and Ideology

Fred Orton’s teaching and writing has always combined theoretical and formal - which is to say structural - analysis with historical research and reflection. This collection of essays - rewritten studies of Paul Cezanne, Jasper Johns, the American cultural critic Harold Rosenberg and a new essay on Marx and Engels’ notion of ideology - brings together some of his most decisive contributions to thinking about fine art practice and rethinking the theory and methods of the social history of art. More than an anthology, it offers a vivid demonstration of how theory can work to generate new interpretations and unsettle old ones.