8 research outputs found
Anti-fascist Art Theory: A Roundtable Discussion
Taking the form of a conversation among three art theorists whose work focuses on contemporary art, culture and emancipatory politics on the left, this roundtable article begins from the question: what concepts and ideas can be drawn into an anti-fascist art theory today? The discussion opens by considering the ambivalence towards speaking about fascism in current debates beyond art and the complex positioning of art between (or rather, across) the status quo and its subversion; proceeds by examining the current technological apparatus as regards the mediation of subjectivity; looks at the articulation of sexuality and whiteness; and concludes by proposing that anti-fascism as a complex political position that crosses an art field sustained also by an attention economy must address the field’s structural procedures of exclusion while also maintain its focus on the specificity of fascist politics
Recommended from our members
In the social factory? Immaterial labour, precariousness and cultural work
This article introduces a special section concerned with precariousness and cultural work. Its aim is to bring into dialogue three bodies of ideas -- the work of the autonomous Marxist 'Italian laboratory'; activist writings about precariousness and precarity; and the emerging empirical scholarship concerned with the distinctive features of cultural work, at a moment when artists, designers and (new) media workers have taken centre stage as a supposed 'creative class' of model entrepreneurs.
The paper is divided into three sections. It starts by introducing the ideas of the autonomous Marxist tradition, highlighting arguments about the autonomy of labour, informational capitalism and the 'factory without walls', as well as key concepts such as multitude and immaterial labour. The impact of these ideas and of Operaismo politics more generally on the precarity movement is then considered in the second section, discussing some of the issues that have animated debate both within and outside this movement, which has often treated cultural workers as exemplifying the experiences of a new 'precariat'. In the third and final section of the paper we turn to the empirical literature about cultural work, pointing to its main features before bringing it into debate with the ideas already discussed. Several points of overlap and critique are elaborated -- focusing in particular on issues of affect, temporality, subjectivity and solidarity
Art
Book synopsis: The past decade has witnessed a resurgence of interest in Marxism both within and without the academy. Marxian frameworks, concepts and categories continue to be narratively relevant to the features and events of contemporary capitalism. Most crucially, an attention to shifting cultural conditions has lead contemporary researchers to re-confront some classical and essential Marxist concepts, as well as elaborating new critical frameworks for the analysis of capitalism today.
The SAGE Handbook of Marxism showcases this cutting-edge of today’s Marxism. It advances the debate with essays that rigorously map and renew the concepts that have provided the groundwork and main currents for Marxist theory, and showcases interventions that set the agenda for Marxist research in the 21st century. A rigorous and challenging collection of scholarship, this book contains a stunning range of contributions from contemporary academics, writers and theorists from around the world and across disciplines, invaluable to scholars and graduate students alike
Disrupting Business: art and activism in times of financial crisis
The book explores some of the interconnections between art, activism and the business concept of disruptive innovation. With a backdrop of the crisis of financial capitalism, austerity cuts in the cultural sphere, the idea is to focus on potential art strategies in relation to a broken economy. In a perverse way, we ask whether this presents new opportunities for cultural producers to achieve more autonomy over their production process? If it is indeed possible or desirable, what alternative business models emerge? The book is concerned broadly with business as (artistic) material for reinvention, including critical writing and examples of art/activist projects