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Face and mask : a double history

Title: Face and mask : a double history / Hans Belting ; translated by Thomas S. Hansen and Abby J. Hansen.
Author: Belting, Hans
Publication: Princeton : Princeton University Press, [2017]
Supplementary Content: Inhaltsverzeichnis

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Status	Format	Access	Call Number	Item Location
Request for On-site Use Request Scan Available - Can be used on site. Please visit New York Public Library - Schwarzman Building to submit a request in person.	Text	Use in library	JQE 17-884	Schwarzman Building - Art & Architecture Room 300

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Description

270 pages : illustrations (some color); 25 cm

Summary

This fascinating book presents the first cultural history and anthropology of the face across centuries, continents, and media. Ranging from funerary masks and masks in drama to the figural work of contemporary artists including Cindy Sherman and Nam June Paik, renowned art historian Hans Belting emphasizes that while the face plays a critical role in human communication, it defies attempts at visual representation. Belting divides his book into three parts: faces as masks of the self, portraiture as a constantly evolving mask in Western culture, and the fate of the face in the age of mass media. Referencing a vast array of sources, Belting's insights draw on art history, philosophy, theories of visual culture, and cognitive science. He demonstrates that Western efforts to portray the face have repeatedly failed, even with the developments of new media such as photography and film, which promise ever-greater degrees of verisimilitude. In spite of sitting at the heart of human expression, the face resists possession, and creative endeavors to capture it inevitably result in masks--hollow signifiers of the humanity they're meant to embody. From creations by Van Eyck and August Sander to works by Francis Bacon, Ingmar Bergman, and Chuck Close, "Face and Mask" takes a remarkable look at how, through the centuries, the physical visage has inspired and evaded artistic interpretation.

Uniform Title

Faces. English

Alternative Title

Faces.

Subjects

Note

Translated from the German.
"First published in Germany under the title Faces: Eine Geschichte des Gesichts."

Bibliography (note)

Includes bibliographical references (pages 263-266) and index.

Contents

Face and Mask: Changing Views -- Portrait and Mask: the Face as Representation -- Media and Masks: the Production of Faces.

Call Number

JQE 17-884

ISBN

9780691162355
0691162352

LCCN

2016021495

OCLC

950901789

Author

Belting, Hans, author.

Title

Face and mask : a double history / Hans Belting ; translated by Thomas S. Hansen and Abby J. Hansen.

Publisher

Princeton : Princeton University Press, [2017]

Type of Content

text

Type of Medium

unmediated

Type of Carrier

volume

Bibliography

Includes bibliographical references (pages 263-266) and index.

Connect to:

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Added Author

Hansen, Thomas S. (Thomas Stansfield), translator.

Hansen, Abby J., 1945- translator.

Research Call Number

JQE 17-884

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