What Artistry Can Do

An anthology of essays by one of Belgium’s most original art theorists. As if looking at society with that same generous mockery that characterized Flemish painters from Bruegel all the way to Ensor, Bart Verschaffel’s prose follows the meandering and often contradictory movements of visual desire. * Emmanuel Alloa, University of Fribourg *
Reflective, combative, and engagingly opinionated, this volume of essays by Bart Verschaffel is motivated by a deep commitment to art, to the importance of its distinctiveness from other forms of cultural production, and to what it means to think and write about it. The author’s elegant and supple writing navigates his materials in ways that are unfailingly persuasive and often surprising, and that – among much else – build a case for an idea that might be seen as both the book’s leitmotif and own self-description: that of artistry as a kind of critical memory work. * Mark Dorrian, Edinburgh College of Art *