Destruction Rites: Ephemerality and Demolition in Postwar Visual Culture

by Mona Hadler

Overview

In the early sixties, crowds gathered to watch rites of destruction – from the demolition derby where makeshift cars crashed into each other for sport, to concerts where musicians destroyed their instruments, to performances of self-destructing machines staged by contemporary artists. Destruction, in both its playful and fearsome aspects, was ubiquitous in the new Atomic Age. This complicated subjectivity was not just a way for people to find catharsis amid the fears of annihilation and postwar trauma, but also a complex instantiation of ideological crisis—in a time with some seriously conflicted political myths.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781786721594
Publisher:	I.B.Tauris
Publication date:	01/30/2017
Series:	20170130
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	272
File size:	10 MB

About the Author

Mona Hadler is Professor of Art History at The Graduate Center, City University of New York (CUNY). She is also on the faculty at Brooklyn College. She has written widely on the art of Lee Bontecou and on the art of 1950s New York.

Editorial Reviews

Hadler demonstrates how destruction, when ritualized in popular culture and fine art, can become enormously productive aesthetically.

David Joselit

‘‘The book … has a clear, powerful point to make, and does so economically, engagingly and thoughtfully… The scholarship is impressive.’’

Jo Applin

‘‘Hadler treats objects of popular culture without condescension, giving them the same thoughtful visual analysis, informed by a deep understanding of history, with which she presents avant-garde art. And she provides a model for interpreting iconoclasm that will be relevant both to art historians in her own field and far beyond it. I’m very grateful for this book.’’

Rachel Kousser