Art & Today is an innovative and extensive survey of international contemporary art from the 1980s to the present. Over four hundred of the most significant contemporary artists from around the world are represented in this comprehensive overview--some emerging, some mid-career, and others long established. Each of the book's sixteen chapters address recurring and relevant themes as diverse as "Art & Popular Culture," "Art & Its Institutions," and "Art & Globalism," rather than follow a strict chronological, geographical, or stylistic structure. Lively and up-to-date, Art & Today explores an era in which art defies simple categorization. The result is a surprising and original yet clear and reasoned perspective on contemporary art that breaks from prescribed classifications to offer a survey as expansive as the art it describes.

For instance, in the chapter "Art & the Body," one might find performance discussed alongside figurative painting, sculpture and photography alongside video, and North American artists alongside Asian artists. The chapter "Art and Globalism" discusses artists whose nationality, generation, and medium are as diverse as those of Alan Sekula, Michal Rovner, Cildo Meireles, Manuel Ocampo, Chen Zhen, and Andreas Gursky. Internationally renowned art critic and scholar, Eleanor Heartney is respected for her clear language and pragmatic approach to contemporary art. Her straightforward, engaging descriptions and explanations will appeal to both experts and newcomers alike, and will serve as an invaluable resource for years to come.

SPECIFICATIONS:

Format: Paperback
Size: 290 x 250 mm (11 3/8 x 9 7/8 in)
Pages: 448 pp
Illustrations: 460 illustrations
ISBN: 9780714866000

Eleanor Heartney has been a contributing editor to Art in America and Artpress for over 10 years, reviewing the most significant international art shows, biennials and documentas around the world. Her recent publications include Postmodernism and Critical Condition: American Culture at the Crossroads--Collected Essays of Eleanor Heartney.

"Coffee tables everywhere are crying out for Phaidon latest tome, Art & Today. It's exactly what you want: a comprehensive overview of art from the Eighties onwards... Arresting images [...] and great prose."—GQ

"A welcome overview of today's confused art world... A valuable reference book... Well-illustrated."—Wall Street Journa

"The overarching point of Art & Today is to show how the certainties of modernism [...] gave way to the anarchy of post-modern, contemporary art... The book attempts to impose some welcome order and logic on the ensuing chaos (and 400 artists): no easy task when the history is happening around you. Heartney, however, proves up to the challenge: she has an accessible prose style, a profound grasp of art history, and a publishing company willing to include 560 illustrations."—Art World

"The history of contemporary art, writes Heartney (Postmodernism), a contributing editor to Art in America, offers a tapestry of stories in an innovative, intellectually vigorous and superbly illustrated survey... Heartney's focus is sharp and selective, and her approach complexly postmodern: the ever-proliferating universe of Matthew Ritchie's installations are discussed in the context of Roland Barthes, Cindy Sherman's photographs as Bakhtinian carnival... This exceptional survey will have wide appeal... in a work that's both perceptive and energetic."—Publishers Weekly