D Giles Limited – Publishers of Fine Art books and History books, Catalogues and Museum Guides

Damaged RomanticismA Mirror of Modern Emotion

Terrie Sultan, David Pagel, Colin Gardner, Nick Flynn, Claudia Schmuckli

Published by GILES in association with Blaffer Gallery, the Art Museum of the University of Houston

Publish Date — September 2008 (UK and USA)

Dimensions — 136 pages, 280mm x 240mm (9 ½ x 11 in.), portrait

Illustrations — 134 colour and 6 b&w illustrations

Paperback price — UK£24.95/US$44.95

ISBN — 1-904832-51-2

ISBN — 978-1-904832-51-5

Book Details (pdf) — Damaged_Romanticism_ai_lowres.pdf

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About the Book

Damaged Romanticism: A Mirror of Modern Emotion features 15 internationally recognized contemporary artists whose work, in painting, sculpture, installations, and photography based media, embodies an essentially idealistic outlook formed of traditional "romanticism", but tempered by a strong sense of reality and stubborn optimism in the face of daily adversity and heartbreaking disappointment. Belonging neither to a style nor a traditional “school”, the artists and works of art featured in this new volume capture the existential dilemma of the human condition.

In her opening essay Terrie Sultan offers an overview of the concept behind the exhibition and explains how the chosen works give form to contradictory feelings of disillusionment and defiance. David Pagel considers the historical and contextual aspects of the subject, and explores how contemporary artists, writers and filmmakers have adapted the idealism of traditional romanticism to suit the needs of the present day. Colin Gardner surveys similar elements in film. He identifies how the theme of renewed hope and dogged determination in the face of devastating existential setback, first seen in the writing of Ernest Hemingway, continued through the work of many French New Wave filmmakers like Jean-Luc Godard and Francois Truffaut, before being reintroduced back into mainstream cinema in the films of David Lynch, Neil Jordan and Todd Haynes.

Each artist and their work is the focus of an individual catalogue entry. The volume also features a newly commissioned short story, a crystal formed entirely of holes, by award-winning contemporary author Nick Flynn.

About the Author(s)

Terrie Sultan is director of The Parrish Art Museum. She was director and chief curator of Blaffer Gallery from 2000–08. She has organized numerous exhibitions, including Chuck Close Prints: Process and Collaboration and James Surls: The Splendora Years, 1977 –1997; David Pagel is an associate professor of art theory and history at Claremont Graduate University. He writes a regular column for the Los Angeles Times and contributes to major art magazines, including Flash Art, Frieze, and Bomb; Colin Gardner is professor of Critical Theory and Integrative Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Publications include a monograph on the Czech born British filmmaker and critic, Karel Reisz (2006), part of Manchester University Press’s British Film Makers series; Nick Flynn is an assistant professor in the Creative Writing Program at the University of Houston. He is author of Some Ether (2000) and Another Bullshit Night in Suck City (2004), which received the PEN/Martha Albrand Award; Claudia Schmuckli is curator of Blaffer Gallery, before which she was assistant curator at The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Past exhibitions include Amy Sillman: Suitors & Strangers (2007), Katrina Moorhead: A Thing Called Early Blur (2007) and Urs Fischer: Mary Poppins (2006), all Blaffer