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Curating the Moving Image

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Book

Pages: 408

Illustrations: 110 color images

Published: May 2023

Author: Mark Nash

In Curating the Moving Image, influential curator and theorist Mark Nash draws on his work at Documenta11, the Venice Biennale, and elsewhere to explore the possibilities of contemporary curation. Constructing this richly illustrated book as a curatorial project in and of itself, Nash outlines several key concepts that range from exhibition architecture and curating as an affective and artistic practice to post-cold war aesthetics and contemporary Chinese art. Throughout these essays on contemporary art, film, and installation, Nash offers critical commentary and reflection on exhibitions he has curated, including those that focus on socialist and utopian ideals following the end of the Cold War. He also folds curating into a discussion of forms of artistic production that are connected to alternative trajectories of collective and collaborative practice. Ultimately, Nash demonstrates that the art world and contemporary curatorial practice constitute some of the most important tools for social and aesthetic exchange in the twenty-first century.

Praise

"As a well-established pioneer in curatorial studies, Nash provides copious notes and a well-stocked bibliography to enable expansion into this important area of research and scholarship." - Mike Leggett, Leonardo Reviews

"Rather than a historical recounting of film’s convergence with contemporary art exhibition, Curating the Moving Image narrates a very personal trajectory, intent on reconciling two modes of moving image often set up in opposition." - Lucy Reynolds, Screen

"Multiple pasts traverse Curating the Moving Image, a handsomely designed book: they range from Mark Nash’s own left-leaning pasts, post-1968 and post-1989 political legacies, and the art-house cinemas of his formative years. . . . Accessibly couched in the authorial voice of the ‘I’, Curating the Moving Image situates Nash’s interests in the communality of moving-image forms in terms of the cinematic." - Maria Walsh, Art Monthly

"Curating the Moving Image is an inspiring volume containing many photographs and diagrams from the various exhibitions Nash cites. I would recommend it to scholars and practitioners interested in the intersection of visual art and cinema. It is relevant to those who are eager to explore with others how best to re-examine the past in the present moment." - Phoebe Hart, Media International Australia

"Curating the Moving Image provides readers with ample criticism of art from the post-Communist Revolution and the People's Republic of China." - Mackenzie Anne Williams, ARLIS/NA

"Nash displays a wide-ranging knowledge and understanding of the history of avant garde, political, independent and artists’ film. . ... Nash has generously shared his experience as a theorist and curator with verve and erudition." - Jane Madsen, Moving Image Review & Art Journal

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Mark Nash is an independent curator, film historian, and filmmaker. He is Professor of Film and Digital Media and of History of Consciousness and cofounder with Isaac Julien of the Moving Image Lab at the University of California, Santa Cruz. He is also author of Screen Theory Culture and Experiments with Truth, and editor of Red Africa: Affective Communities and the Cold War. Nash worked closely with the late Okwui Enwezor on several large exhibitions including The Short Century and Documenta11 as well as the New Museum’s Grief and Grievance: Art and Mourning in America.

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Paper ISBN: 978-1-4780-2044-8 /