Available Formats
Gaga Aesthetics: Art, Fashion, Popular Culture, and the Up-Ending of Tradition
By (Author) Adam Geczy
By (author) Vicki Karaminas
Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Bloomsbury Academic
18th May 2023
United Kingdom
Tertiary Education
Non Fiction
700.103
Paperback
224
Width 156mm, Height 234mm
Pop art has traditionally been the most visible visual art within popular culture because its main transgression is easy to understand: the infiltration of the low into the high. The same cannot be said of contemporary art of the 21st century, where the term Gaga Aesthetics characterizes the condition of popular culture being extensively imbricated in high culture, and vice-versa. Taking Adorno and Horkheimers "The Culture Industry" and Adornos Aesthetic Theory as key touchstones, this book explores the dialectic of high and low that forms the foundation of Adornian aesthetics and the extent to which it still applied, and the extent to which it has radically shifted, thereby upending tradition. In the tradition of philosophical aesthetics that Adorno began with Lukcs, this explores the ever-urgent notion that high culture has become deeply enmeshed with popular culture. This is Gaga Aesthetics: aesthetics that no longer follows clear fields of activity, where fine art is but one area of critical activity. Indeed, Adornos concepts of alienation and the tragic, which inform his reading of the modernist experiment, are now no longer confined to art. Rather, stirring examples can be found in phenomena such as fashion and music video. In addition to dealing with Lady Gaga herself, this book traverses examples ranging from Madonnas Madam X to Moschino and Vetements, to deliberate on the strategies of subversion in the culture industry.
Starting from the question of culture and the up-ending of tradition, passing through Hegel, Adorno, the culture industry, light music, jazz and fashion, examining closely the aesthetics of alienation, ugliness and kitsch, and finally arriving to Madonna and Lady Gaga, Gaga Aesthetics offers a convincing and fascinating interpretation of leading trends and fundamental aspects of both contemporary art and everyday life, which can be of the greatest concern not only for academic scholars but also, in general, for all readers genuinely interested in understanding our time. * Stefano Marino, Associate Professor of Aesthetics, University of Bologna, Italy *
A sharp and polished new theory book by two mature, well-published and highly respected scholars. It represents a major contribution to not just culture studies but to art theory, visual culture, philosophy, fashion theory and communication studies, and it will be of general interest to anyone interested in todays global intersectional and intertextual world. * Joy Sperling, Professor of Art History and Visual Culture, Denison University, USA *
Adam Geczy is an artist and writer who teaches at Sydney College of the Arts at the University of Sydney, Australia. Vicki Karaminas is Professor of Fashion and Director of Doctoral Studies in the School of Design, Massey University, New Zealand, and Honorary Research Fellow at the Centre of Visual Arts, University of Melbourne, Australia.