Art of Transition

Art of Transition offers an unprecedented ethnographic view of the field of art in Russia between two eras of world-historical significance, socialism and global capitalism, and shows how the Russian art world has negotiated its cultural standing in an unequal, globalized present.

The dissolution of the Soviet Union brought a massive change in every domain of life, particularly in the cultural sector, where artists were suddenly "free" from party-mandated modes of representation and now could promote and sell their work globally. But in Russia, the encounter with Western art markets was fraught. The Russian field of art still remains on the periphery of the international art world, struggling for legitimacy in the eyes of foreign experts and collectors. This book examines the challenges Russian art world actors faced in building a field of art in a society undergoing rapid and significant economic, political, and social transformation and traces those challenges into the twenty-first century. Drawing on historical and ethnographic research, Art of Transition traces the ways the field of art has developed, evolved, and been sustained in Russia after socialism. It shows how Russia's art world has grappled with its Soviet past and negotiated its standing in an unequal, globalized present. By attending to the historical legacy of Russian art throughout the twentieth century, this book constructs a genealogy of the contemporary field of postsocialist art that illuminates how Russians have come to understand themselves and their place in the world.

Autorentext

Elise Herrala teaches in the Department of Humanistic Studies at the Maryland Institute College of Art. She holds a doctorate in sociology from the University of California, Berkeley.

Zusammenfassung
Art of Transition offers an unprecedented ethnographic view of the field of art in Russia between two eras of world-historical significance, socialism and global capitalism, and shows how the Russian art world has negotiated its cultural standing in an unequal, globalized present.

Inhalt

List of Illustrations

Note on Transliteration

Acknowledgments

Introduction: Toward a Postsocialist Field of Art

1. From Last to First: Two Generations of Postsocialist Russian Artists

2. Collecting for the Nation

3. Building the Field through the Market: The Role of Galleries

4. "History is Repeating Itself": Russian Art and the State

5. Neither Here nor There: Russia in the Global Art World

Conclusion: The Field of Art in Russia and Beyond

Index