A pioneering publication!
Scenography & Art History
Our anthology Scenography and Art History reimagines
scenography as a critical concept for art history, and is the first book to demonstrate the
importance and usefulness of this concept for art historians and scholars in related fields. The book was first published in June 2021 by Bloomsbury and now is also available in paperback. We are thrilled about the fantastic endorsements - read them below:
'Spatial, temporal, affective, critical, and embodied dimensions of scenographic perspectives inform this cross-disciplinary, multifaceted anthology. An unprecedented dialogue between art history and scenography, this volume is both urgent and necessary, exploring the multisensory workings that can shape culture through scenographic phenomena.' Donatella Barbieri, Senior Research Fellow and Principal Lecturer in design for performance, University of the Arts London, UK
'The editors of this provocative and stimulating collection of essays use the concepts of scenography and art history to mutually challenge and expand the analytic potential of each to provide important new strategies for exploring the increasingly complex world of contemporary art.' Marvin Carlson, Distinguished Professor, Theatre and Performance, CUNY, USA
'This important study shifts our perceptions and understandings of what scenography is. It shows us how agential modes of creative practice can lead towards new theoretical frameworks and how the expanded relationality between objects, subjects, spaces, and ideas can help us forging new realities within and outside the world of art history.' Alda Terracciano, Participatory Design Consultant at The Sloane Lab, UCL Department of Information Studies, UK
Scenography and Art History is a thrillingly multifaceted and innovative collection of cross-disciplinary case studies unlocking the potentials of scenography as an overlooked sphere, concept and phenomenon in relation to art history as well as to other aesthetic disciplines. Andrea Kollnitz, Associate Professor in Art History, Department of Culture and Aesthetics, Stockholm University, Sweden
The book is a very important contribution to current discussions on multisensory art historical and contemporary events by proposing scenography both as a theoretical concept and as a practical exercise in the field of art history and related disciplines.
Andrea Sommer-Mathis, Former Senior Research Asscociate at the Austrian Academy of Sciences, Austria
Check it out! Link here
Cover photo: Rena Narumi, Dancer, the Royal Swedish Ballet, Karolina Henke/Skarp 2014.
The aim of the project and book is to
■Discuss the ways in which reimagined scenography both revitalizes and critically expands how art history and related branches of study address events, objects and actions in all sorts of environments.
■Examine how scenography is no longer restricted to the traditional space of the theatre, but has responded to theoretical changes and become an important art history concept for approaching historical and contemporary visual objects, actions and events.
■Explore reimagined scenography not solely as a critical approach and theoretical concept, but also as an important practice linked with unseen labour in a great variety of contexts (such as live concerts, fashion settings, advertising or archival studies).
■Consider the future of scenography by
investigating the rise of new ways of applying the concept within art history and
related branches of study.
Photo / film credit: Linda Sternö and Karin Ekberg.