Conversation Pieces: Community and Communication in Modern Art

by Grant H. Kester

Some of the most innovative art of the past decade has been created far outside conventional galleries and museums. In a parking garage in Oakland, California; on a pleasure boat on the Lake of Zurich in Switzerland; at a public market in Chiang Mai, Thailand--artists operating at the intersection of art and cultural activism have been developing new forms of collaboration with diverse audiences and communities. Their projects have addressed such issues as political conflict in Northern Ireland, gang violence on Chicago's West Side, and the problems of sex workers in Switzerland. Provocative, accessible, and engaging, this book, one of the first full-length studies on the topic, situates these socially conscious projects historically, relates them to key issues in contemporary art and art theory, and offers a unique critical framework for understanding them.

Grant Kester discusses a disparate network of artists and collectives--including The Art of Change, Helen and Newton Harrison, Littoral, Suzanne Lacy, Stephen Willats, and WochenKlausur--united by a desire to create new forms of understanding through creative dialogue that crosses boundaries of race, religion, and culture. Kester traces the origins of these works in the conceptual art and feminist performance art of the 1960s and 1970s and draws from the writings of Mikhail Bakhtin, Jurgen Habermas, and others as he explores the ways in which these artists corroborate and challenge many of the key principles of avant-garde art and art theory.

Genres: Art, Nonfiction, Academia, Cultural

264 pages, ebook

First published July 13, 2004

Reviews

[Brycedwyer · Rating 3 out of 5]

writing about "dialogical" projects valued using the discarded values of modernism but asserting their status as artworks by virtue of their (purported) engagement with these discarded values. it's really strange when you think about. picking up the scraps at the paper cutter of modernism, making them into something, and then calling it art because they came from trimmings around the paper cutter...basically - there either has to be a more compelling reason that this stuff is "art" or a more compelling way of speaking about this stuff (that may or may not be art or who cares) in general

[Christina · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great after reading relational Aesthetics

[Jess · Rating 4 out of 5]

Its a thought provoking read on the participatory art projects, although flawed. Still If this is your interest area practically or curatorially, Kester's work is one perspective you should read.

[Abigail Powell · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5/5
While at times overly elucidative, Kester's Conversation Pieces is a comprehensive introduction to dialogic art and the artists leading the charge in contemporary society. Kester’s interrogation of dialogic art through the lens of the Evangelical tradition of social work, in line with his subsequent analysis of Dedeaux’s Soul Shadows exhibition, was particularly pointed: “The artist remains in a position of relative mastery, operating as a living paradigm of the expressive personality that his or her collaborators can aspire to or temporarily adopt as their own…Alternatively, the artist seeks to resuscitate their “self-esteem” and offer them a creative experience that will help them become “participants in their own reclamation.” Conversation Pieces is a work that I do hope to revisit in the future.

[Chad Dembski · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a re-read for me but I was surprised how much more I got out of it a second time. While not the most contemporary book on the subject at all it brings up great questions and points. While published by a University press it does attempt to not be too academic in it's concepts and wording.
Highlights a variety of excellent projects that work in the fields of community art, socially engaged art and dialogical art. He mentions at the end of the book how the genre alone of this work has endless titles and ways of being interpreted.
As someone being to create a new project in this field I found it constantly engaging and essential in helping me frame my work.

[Mills College Library]

701.03 K428 2004