Publisher's Synopsis
Literary Nonfiction. Art Criticism. TEXTS ON (TEXTS ON) ART collects art historian Joseph Masheck's essays on the interplay of texts and art, texts and texts, and art and art into an imaginative volume that speaks to the range and depth of textual and visual intersections in the history of art. Demonstrating an enormous scope of knowledge and research, Masheck delves into Alois Riegl's art historical grammar, the unlikely connection between Henri Matisse and American painter Albert Pinkham Ryder, Duchamp's playful riff on the face of Mona Lisa and (maybe?) George Santayana, Le Corbusier's influence on Breton's novella Nadja, spirituality and caricature in Ad Reinhardt's work, Florenskian icons in Lacanian theory, Mike Bidlo's Warholian Brillo Boxes, and more. Together the essays comprise a wide-ranging and penetrating inquiry into the influence of history upon art, and art upon its history.