Valeria Kosyakova is a PhD candidate in cultural studies, an associate professor at the Russian State University for the Humanities' School of European Cultures, the founder of the Punktum Center, and a researcher of visual culture.
Dmitry Pozdnyakov is a specialist in the history and theory of cinema and visual art, and a cultural scholar. This is an engaging art detective story about revolutions and transformations in art. The authors don't simply list the names of famous artists, movements, schools, and their corresponding characteristics, but also explain how and why art has changed over the past century and a half.
Why is contemporary art so different from the artistic pursuits of bygone eras? How have ideas about beauty evolved, and how has the role of the artist in society changed? What can help us understand contemporary art? How does it differ from the contemporary art that is being born before our eyes, here and now? The book's current analytical theories and diverse interpretative approaches will help readers gain critical distance for a panoramic view of 20th-century visual culture.