Believing
that artistic expression can and does play an
important role in changing the way we perceive our
relation to the world we live in, art critic John
Grande takes an in-depth look at the work of some
very unusual environmental artists in the United
States, in Canada, and in Europe.
Dealing
with everything from materials, to the politics of
curatorship, the permanence of art works, to the
artist's role as cultural critic, Balance Art and
Nature takes theory into action as it critically
examines the works of Anish Kapoor, Antony Gormley,
Armand Vaillancourt, Bill Reid, Carl Beam, Kevin
Kelly, Ana Mendieta, James Carl, Patrick Dougherty,
Keith Haring, and others. What emerges is a viable
social-environmental framework for evaluating
contemporary art and insights into art's actual and
potential roles.
Grande's
commentaries represent an important contribution
to the theory of art. --Claude Lévi-Strauss
Here
is a call to reawaken creativity in this time of
alienation.
--Antony Gormley
Encourages
us to rethink what it means to be an artist in a
time of global eco-crisis. --Suzi Gablik, The
Re-enchantment of Art
Makes
unexpected connections giving new insights into
contemporary art.
--Public Art Review
Grande's
book contains a lot of ideas, all of which are
thought-provoking.
--Globe and Mail
Details
makes this book convincing. --Books
In Canada
The
book contains numerous apt illustrations...but
its main virtue lies in Grande's visible
determination to provoke and stimulate.
--Canadian Forum
Grande's
ideas and style are fresh, sincere, intuitive,
lively and compelling.
--Journal of Comparative
Literature and Aesthetics
Offers
interesting parallels between different aspects
of public art.
--Espace Sculptur
Table of Contents
Writer
and art critic JOHN GRANDE's reviews and feature
articles have been published in art magazines and
catalogues internationally. He is the author of Intertwining:
Landscape, Technology, Issues, Artists (Black Rose
Books), Jouer avec le feu: Armand Vaillancourt:
Sculpteur engagéé (Lanctot) and David Sorensen:
Abstraction From Here to Now, and co-author of
Nils-Udo: Art with Nature (Wienand Verlag) and Art
Nature Dialogues (SUNY Press).
275
pages, 6x9, 70 illustrations, bibliography, index
Paperback ISBN: 1-55614-234-4 $24.99
Hardcover ISBN: 1-55614-235-2 $53.99
Art Criticism / Ecology
and the Environment
October
2003
