Symbolist Objects |
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Symbolist Objects: Materiality and Subjectivity at the Fin-de-Siècle edited by Claire I. R. O'Mahony This interdisciplinary volume explores the intersections between Symbolist aesthetics and material objects and interiors. Fourteen international scholars examine these debates from the overlapping perspectives of the disciplines of literary studies, the history of art, design and visual culture and aesthetic philosophy. Five thematic sections apply a spectrum of approaches to visual and literary case studies from fin-de-siècle Europe. The book opens with analyses of the interiority articulated through the domestic environments of Comte Robert de Montesquiou and Oscar Wilde. The second section juxtaposes four engagements with the artful page and the ‘book beautiful’ devised by Stéphane Mallarmé, John Gray, William Morris and Alfred Jarry. The third cluster of essays considers art works and spaces by Fernand Khnopff, Puvis de Chavannes and René Binet which took on talismanic status at the fin de siècle. By contrast the interventions in the fourth section explore the gendered tensions between preciousness and consumer culture in the writings of Villiers de l’Isle-Adam, Joséphin Péladan and Georges Rodenbach, and both Rachilde’s evocations of, and René Lalique’s designs for, jewellery. The collection concludes with meditations on the legacies of Symbolist aesthetics within the work of Robert Motherwell and contemporary installation art. This anthology should be of special interest to fin-de-siècle scholars, whilst accessible to a more general readership. |
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Hardbound: 15.9 x 23.5 cm., 444 pp., illustrated. ISBN 978 1 904201 15 1 £40.00 / $65.00 To purchase please click here |
Introduction: Subjective Objects claire i r o’mahony INTERIORS AND INTERIORITY Misunderstood Symbolism: Rereading the Subjective Objects of Montesquiou’s First Maison d’un artiste elizabeth emery Objects and Interiors: Oscar Wilde richard w hayes THE SUBJECTICITY OF THE ARTFUL PAGE Potential Images in Mallarmé’s Un Coup de dés katherine shingler Th e Fin-de-Siècle Book as Art Object: John Gray, poet philip healy Th e Quest for Verbal/Visual Cosmos in William Morris’s Calligraphy and Typography paola spinozzi Merde and Diamonds: Alfred Jarry’s Les Minutes de Sable Memorial and César-Antechrist jill fell TALISMANS The Archaeology of Dreams: Fernand Khnopff, Henri Cros and the Mask rachel sloan Talisman for the Symbolist Movement: Puvis de Chavannes’ Hope erika schneider A World of Things in Emergence and Growth: René Binet’s Porte Monumentale at the 1900 Paris Exposition robert proctor TRINKETS AND FETISHES Destruction and the Gift geneviève sicotte The ‘artistiques bijoux d’acier’ in The Marquise de Sade: Shifts of Power sophie pelletier René Lalique and the Subjectification of the Jewel claire i r o’mahony LEGACIES Baudelaire, Mallarmé and the Symbolist Aesthetics of Robert Motherwell william m perthes Insects, Design and Illusion: Symbolism and Subjectivity marjan groot Bibliography Notes on Contributors |
| Published 15 October 2009 | |
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