This catalogue is published in conjunction with "Delirious: Art at the Limits of Reason, 1950-1980," on view at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, from September 13, 2017 through January 14, 2018. Includes bibliographical references (pages 229-231) and index.
Contents:
Think crazy: the art and history of delirium / Kelly Baum -- Bite your tongue: Antonin Artaud and the neo-avant-garde / Lucy Bradnock -- Blown circuits: technology and irrationality in postwar art / Tine Rivers Ryan -- Plates. Excess -- Vertigo -- Twisted -- Nonsense.
Summary:
Addressing the maniacal, eccentric, and disorienting in artworks made between 1950 and 1980, Delirious situates a fascination with the absurd and irrational within the context of the violence and brutality witnessed during World War II as well as the rapid expansion of industrial capitalism in the 1950s. Skepticism of science and technology--along with fear of its capability to promote mass destruction--developed into a distrust of rationalism, which in the arts had the paradoxical result of extracting irrational effects from rational means.
This resource is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act as administered by State Library of Iowa.