
Portrait
Jean-Luc Nancy(Author)
Fordham University Press
Published on 12. June 2018
Book
Hardback
140 pages
978-0-8232-7994-4 (ISBN)
Description
This book examines the practice of portraits as a way in to grasping the paradoxes of subjectivity. To Nancy, the portrait is suspended between likeness and strangeness, identity and distance, representation and presentation, exactitude and forcefulness. It can identify an individual, but it can also express the dynamics by means of which its subject advances and withdraws.
The book consists of two extended essays written a decade apart but in close conversation, in which Nancy considers the range of aspirations articulated by the portrait. Heavily illustrated, it includes a newly written preface bringing the two essays together and a substantial Introduction by Jeffrey Librett, which places Nancy's work within the range of thinking of aesthetics and the subject, from religion, to aesthetics, to psychoanalysis.
Though undergirded by a powerful grasp of the philosophical and psychoanalytic tradition that has rendered our sense of the subject so problematic, Nancy's book is at heart a delightful, unpretentious reading of three dozen portraits, from ancient drinking mugs to recent experimental or parodic pieces in which the artistic representation of a sitter is made from their blood, germ cultures, or DNA.
The contemporary world of ubiquitous photos, Nancy argues, in no way makes the portrait a thing of the past. On the contrary, the forms of appearing that mark the portrait continue to challenge how we see the bodies and representations that dominate our world.
The book consists of two extended essays written a decade apart but in close conversation, in which Nancy considers the range of aspirations articulated by the portrait. Heavily illustrated, it includes a newly written preface bringing the two essays together and a substantial Introduction by Jeffrey Librett, which places Nancy's work within the range of thinking of aesthetics and the subject, from religion, to aesthetics, to psychoanalysis.
Though undergirded by a powerful grasp of the philosophical and psychoanalytic tradition that has rendered our sense of the subject so problematic, Nancy's book is at heart a delightful, unpretentious reading of three dozen portraits, from ancient drinking mugs to recent experimental or parodic pieces in which the artistic representation of a sitter is made from their blood, germ cultures, or DNA.
The contemporary world of ubiquitous photos, Nancy argues, in no way makes the portrait a thing of the past. On the contrary, the forms of appearing that mark the portrait continue to challenge how we see the bodies and representations that dominate our world.
More details
Series
Edition
New edition
Language
English
Place of publication
New York
United States
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Edition type
New edition
Product notice
Cloth over boards
Illustrations
36
Dimensions
Height: 231 mm
Width: 155 mm
Thickness: 15 mm
Weight
318 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-8232-7994-4 (9780823279944)
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Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions

Persons
Jean-Luc Nancy (1940-2021) was Distinguished Professor of Philosophy at the Universite de Strasbourg and one of the late twentieth and early twenty-first century's foremost thinkers of politics, art, and the body. His wide-ranging thought runs through many books, including Being Singular Plural, The Ground of the Image, Corpus, The Disavowed Community, and Sexistence. His book The Intruder was adapted into an acclaimed film by Claire Denis.
Sarah Clift is Assistant Professor of Contemporary Studies at the University of King's College, Halifax.
Jeffrey S. Librett is Professor of German at the University of Oregon.
Sarah Clift is Assistant Professor of Contemporary Studies at the University of King's College, Halifax.
Jeffrey S. Librett is Professor of German at the University of Oregon.
Content
Preface to the English-Language Edition
Introduction: The Subject of the Portrait
By Jeffrey S. Librett
The Look of the Portrait
The Autonomous Portrait
Resemblance
Recall
Look
The Other Portrait
List of Figures
Introduction: The Subject of the Portrait
By Jeffrey S. Librett
The Look of the Portrait
The Autonomous Portrait
Resemblance
Recall
Look
The Other Portrait
List of Figures