Transgressions: The Offences of Art

By Anthony Julius

Since the mid-nineteenth century, artists have compulsively rejected received ideas in order to test and subvert morality, law, society, and even art itself. But what happens when all boundaries have been crossed, all taboos broken, all limits violated?

Transgressions is the first book to address this controversial subject. Here Anthony Julius traces the history of subversion in art from the outraged response to Manet's Le D jeuner sur l'Herbe to the scandal caused by the grant programs of the National Endowment for the Arts a century and a half later. Throughout the book, and supported by the work of such artists as Marcel Duchamp, the Chapman brothers, Andres Serrano, Damien Hirst, Gilbert & George, Paul McCarthy, Jeff Koons, Hans Haacke, and Anselm Kiefer, Julius shows how the modern period has been characterized by three kinds of transgressive art: an art that perverts established art rules; an art that defiles the beliefs and sentiments of its audience; and an art that challenges and disobeys the rules of the state.

The evidence assembled, Julius concludes his hard-hitting dissection of the landscapes of contemporary art by posing some important questions: what is art's future when its boundary-exceeding, taboo-breaking endeavors become the norm? And is anything of value lost when we submit to art's violation?

Transgressions is not a comfortable--still less a comforting--read, but it has a powerful urgency that makes it an essential document for anyone involved in our cultural life at the beginning of the twenty-first century.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0226415368
• ISBN13: 9780226415369
• Release Date: March 2003
• Publisher: University of Chicago Press
• Length: 272 Pages
• Weight: 1.95 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 6.6" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

What are art's boundaries?

This book does have a lot of flaws: a muddled attempt at piecing together a linear narrative of transgressive art as he defines it; a lack of real polemic bite, if such was the intent; a strange typology of trangessions in art that are not argued for convincingly; a couple of chapters at the end of the book that seem to be complete filler entirely. But I liked it nonetheless. I actually found it quite stimulating to the mind. It is because he raises the perenially important questions that are relevant in any serious discussion about art. Just how far are you willing to allow an artist into your own soul and in what circumstances? How much are you willing to be violated and does art always have to violate? What is the value in art that merely tries to do rule-breaking for the sake of breaking rules? What is the value of shock art in an age that is inundated by works of shock art? Can art be really effective in a political sense? When does art stop being art and just is damaging to the soul in every respect? You will not find answers to any of these here. You also have to read a lot of scholarly-like muddle musing about it, but I think it is important to have people remind us of these questions from time to time. No -- I would say it is almost essential if you are going to live a life of art as I do. Read this book if these topics are of interest to you.

Is it scat or art?

This book nudges up to all kinds of scary issues: pornography, images of violence, censorship, freedom of expression. The brilliant lawyer Anthony Julius takes as his occasion the ways in which modern art since the mid nineteenth century has taken as part of its mission to challenge (and raise into public consciousness) the moral and cultural norms of a society. When is a work of art pornographic? When does it portray and comment upon a work of such savage violence that we are violated by being challenged to even look at it? What role does satire play in massaging transgressive images and their ideas for general consumption? From Manet's "Olympia" to Serrano's "Piss Christ," Julius assembles the evidence in this broadly and wonderfully written account of a modern phenomenon. Highly recommended.