Art theory interrogates the foundations and evolution of artistic practice through both historical and contemporary lenses. It examines the formal elements of artefacts, the cultural systems within ...

Hal Foster is one of the most well-known thinkers about art today. In a career that spans several decades, he is known for important much-cited books including The Return of the Real from 1996, Design ...

This is going to be a longer essay than I initially thought I’d write about conspiracy theory. It began in my head as me thinking about a few points I would have added to something I’d recently ...

André Breton “Objet à fonctionnement symbolique” (1931) (photo by Georges Meguerditchian, courtesy the Centre Pompidou) (click to enlarge) PARIS — Where the newness of art comes from (when it comes) ...

A pilot study from a group of Dutch scientists implies that being told that an image is an artwork automatically changes our response, both on a neural and behavioural level. This may mean that our ...

Did you know that Ayn Rand had a theory of art? No? Neither did I! But I discovered it recently, thanks to a tip from painter Abigail Markov. It’s encapsulated in the hefty 539-page treatise “What Art ...