ella turenne

Searching for America: Essays on Art and Architecture
Cambridge Scholars Press
Editor: Robert Sheardy Jr.
ISBN: 1-84718-081-7

The fourteen essays in this collection were drawn from papers presented at the annual conference of the American Culture Association in April of 2006. The widely ranging topics and diverse points of view are typical of papers showcased by this organization of educators, writers, cultural critics and graduate students. These essays each consider the pedagogical parameters by which the art of the United States is defined and, as we are a nation of many voices, they further represent the multicultural identities of America and its citizens. From traditional art historical analysis to post-modernist deconstruction, the authors represented herein explore paintings, prints, sculpture, and architectural objects, in the context of history, philosophy, aesthetics, and political points of view. The writers themselves represent multidisciplinary viewpoints, from art history to literature to architecture and social work. Their papers reflect current scholarship, speaking from the most up to date of pedagogies, and in voices which are both critical and analytical. They further speak for the American Culture Association whose mission it is to explore "all manifestations of the cultures of the Americas."

"In his search for essays on American art, editor Robert Sheardy, Jr has produced a collection that, like the field of American art history itself, contains a variety of approaches, here taken up by an equally diverse group of scholars drawn from the ranks of art and architectural historians, artists, architects, literary scholars, curators, journalists, and political activists, who hail from the U.S., Panama, Iran, and Japan. Some exploit the insights of philosophy and literary theory, bringing together Georges Bataille and Ana Mendieta, Omar Khayyám and Elihu Vedder, and Don DeLillo and Andy Warhol. Others ground their investigations in the social history of art, revealing the visual narratives of social activism in Chicago, Philadelphia, Brooklyn, and New Orleans. Still others look to urban studies, visual studies, feminist studies, and critical race theory, tracing scars in the urban landscape, the artistic influence of mid-19th century women's magazines and mid-20th century art magazines, and the boundaries of whiteness in early 20th century portraiture. Written by both seasoned veterans and newcomers to the field, these essays add yet further information to our discussions of well-known American artists and architects—Elihu Vedder, Robert Henri, George Luks, Christo, Louis Kahn—while also introducing us to lesser known figures—Morris Topchevsky—and providing us a window on the rapidly evolving and expanding field of American art history."
—Frances K. Pohl, Professor of Art History, Pomona College, Author of Framing America: A Social History of American Art

"This unconventional and highly stimulating anthology on historical and contemporary topics in American art and architecture presents a series of polemical, provocative, and refreshing essays by a lineup of authors ranging from emerging scholars to established academics, social activists, artists, and architects. The range of topics is equally diverse, extending from nineteenth-century print culture to contemporary urban space, but all of the essays address crucial issues of American identity, as filtered through the works of individual artists, stamped upon the metropolitan landscape, or refracted through searing images of terror and trauma. Erudite yet at the same time engagingly readable, these lively and thought-provoking pieces seek "America" in places both familiar and strange, while illuminating art's vital, if often troubling, presence in American spaces past and present."
—Sarah Burns, Professor of Art History, Indiana University, Author of Painting the Darks Side: Art and the Gothic Imagination in Nineteenth Century America

Robert Sheardy, Jr. is professor of art history at Kendall College of Art and Design in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He has published essays on John Vanderlyn's Massacre of Jane McCrae, and Elihu Vedder's Lunettes for the Library of Congress. He is currently working on a history of the art of illustration.