Civic Aesthetics

Noa Roei is Assistant Professor in the Comparative Literature and Cultural Analysis department at the University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands and a research fellow at the Amsterdam School of Cultural Analysis.

• List of IllustrationsAcknowledgementsIntroductionIn Search of a Civic AestheticsBetween Critique and ComplicityShowing Seeing: The Critical ImageChapter 1: Can(n)ons of Israeli SocietyFrames and Set-UpsSoldier Figures, Civilian Militarism, and Israeli ArtTaking Sides: Exhibitions as Framing AgentsVisual PerformativesCritical FrictionsChapter 2: Bodies of the Nation: Eroticized SoldiersSerial QuotationsNational BodiesRewriting the Jewish Body, AgainWomen SoldiersQueer Dreams of the NationChapter 3: Looking Through LandscapeThe Landscape Way of SeeingThe “Stifling of the Gaze”Israeli MindscapesChapter 4: Kebab in Theory: Mapping VisionZooming in on the Thinking ImageContesting Mis/interpretationsThe Archaeology of the Still Life: Bringing back the Anti-ImageDistortion and Desire: The Mapping ImpulseSeeing Green: Shaping EmplacementChapter 5: Greetings to the Soldier-Citizen: Consuming NostalgiaPeace, Security, and SparklesFrom Guns to Cream CheeseThe Politics of NostalgiaPreposterous PostcardsThe Limits of Critical DiscourseChapter 6: Fence Art: Re/Framing PoliticsBil’in and Beyond: Aesthetics of DisagreementRedistributing VisibilityChanging Contexts, Shifting FramesConclusion: the Work, the World, and the Critical ImageWorks Cited Index

Civic Aesthetics is an original contribution to an understanding of the links among culture, art, and militarism. Roei skillfully employs a complex academic and artistic perspective in order to problematize the very basic questions of art and Israeli identity. This book will surely serve as a worthwhile resource for scholars from a diverse range of disciplines.