* Explores important concepts and perspectives in the anthropology of art. * Includes nine groundbreaking case studies by an internationally renowned group of art historians and art theorists. * Covers a wide range of periods, including Bronze-Age China, Classical Greece, Rome, and Mayan, as well as the modern Western world.
Art's Agency and Art History develops a scintillating dialogue between anthropology and art history. It throws the subject of the anthropology of art into striking and much-needed relief, by re-articulating its relationships to key methodological and theoretical approaches in art history, sociology, and linguistics. Using Alfred Gell's influential work as a touchstone, the book showcases nine groundbreaking case studies by an internationally renowned group of art historians and art theorists. Following an accessible introductory to Gell's anthropology of art, and its relationship with contemporary art history, the collection explores concepts and perspectives in a wide range of contexts, ranging from such cultures as Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia, to those of Classical Greece and Rome, Imperial China, the Moche of Peru, and finally the modern Western world.
