Art and Humanist Ideals: Contemporay Perspectives

In a radical departure form the conventional art history text, this unique volume brings together a number of the world’s great artist/image-makers and thinkers on issues of art and its expression for contemporary humanity. With early seminal texts by novelist Thomas Mann, theologian Paul Tillich, art historian Herbert Read as a foundation, the content then moves through late 20th century to post September 11’ material with contributions by Lucy R. Lippard, Barry Schwartz, Suzi Gablik, Vaclav Havel, Philippa Hobbs, Elizabeth Rankin, Guenter Grass, Doreen Mellor, Douglas Kellner, Robert Godfrey, Ricardo Levins Morales, Nigel Spivey and others. It bridges grass-roots to academic cultural dialogue. Focusing on prints - limited editions, hand-pulled posters and photographs - it includes images from poster collectives, work by Peter Schumann from the cheap art movement’, photographs by Judith Joy Ross, Dominic Hsieh and Nick Ut’s powerful image Vietnam Napalm’. There are drawings and llimited edition prints by leading artist/printmakers from Europe, Africa, Asia, the Middle East, australia, and North and South America.
It is a book that intelligently celebrates the engagement of art with life - with issues of social justice, peace, human rights - paying tribute to the seldom acknowledged contribution of Modern Art to humanist thought. In so going, it reassesses what have been regional perspectives as compared to the world-wide contribution of humanist art.