
Breaking Resemblance
The Role of Religious Motifs in Contemporary Art
Alena Alexandrova(Author)
Fordham University Press
Will be published approx. on 1. May 2017
Book
Hardback
288 pages
978-0-8232-7447-5 (ISBN)
Description
In recent decades curators and artists have shown a distinct interest in religion, its different traditions, manifestations in public life, gestures and images. Breaking Resemblance explores the complex relationship between contemporary art and religion by focusing on the ways artists re-work religious motifs as a means to reflect critically on our desire to believe in images, on the history of seeing them, and on their double power- iconic and political. It discusses a number of exhibitions that take religion as their central theme, and a selection of works by Bill Viola, Lawrence Malstaf, Victoria Reynolds, and Berlinde de Bruyckere-all of whom, in their respective ways and media, recycle religious motifs and iconography and whose works resonate with, or problematize the motif of, the true image.
Reviews / Votes
"Breaking Resemblance is a consistently thoughtful, well-informed, original examination of modern art and some of its principal debts to the visuality of Christianity." -- -David Morgan Duke University "This fascinating book examines the presence and meaning of religious motifs, and references to religion, mostly Christian and especially Catholic, in various examples of contemporary dating from the 1990s to the present day in Europe and the United States. Especially exploring how religious motifs are appropriated and recycled, Alexandrova considers how and why contemporary artists transform and in some cases defuse religious imagery." -- -Erika Doss University of Notre DameMore details
Language
English
Place of publication
New York
United States
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Product notice
Cloth over boards
Dimensions
Height: 231 mm
Width: 155 mm
Thickness: 18 mm
Weight
522 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-8232-7447-5 (9780823274475)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions

E-Book
05/2017
1st Edition
Fordham University Press
€84.99
Available for download
Person
Alena Alexandrova is Associate Professor at the Faculty of Fine Art, Music and Design, University of Bergen.
Content
List of Figures Preface and Acknowledgments Introduction: Situating Contemporary Art and Religion 1. Veronicas and Artists 2. Breaking the Religious Image: Re-Inventing Religion in Art 3. Between Critical Displacements and Spiritual Affirmations 4. Images Between Religion and Art 5. The Video Veronicas of Bill Viola 6. Images That Do Not Rest: The Installations of Lawrence Malstaf 7. Illusionism Cut: the Painting of Victoria Reynolds 8. The Body Recast: The Sculpture of Berlinde de Bruyckere Conclusion Notes Bibliography Index