The aesthetic exception

The aesthetic exception theorises anew the relation between art and politics. It challenges critical trends that discount the role of aesthetic autonomy, to impulsively reassert art as an effective form of social engagement. But it equally challenges those on the flipside of the efficacy debate, who insist that art’s politics is limited to a recondite space of ‘autonomous resistance’.

Overview of the book

The book shows how each side of the efficacy debate overlooks art’s exceptional status and its social mediations. Mobilising philosophy and cultural theory, and employing examples from visual art, performance, and theatre, it proposes four alternative tests to ‘effect’ to offer a nuanced account of art’s political character.

Key concepts

Those tests examine how art relates to politics as a practice that articulates its historical conjuncture, and how it prefigures the ‘new’ through simulations capable of activating the political life of the spectator.