Why did Picasso (and Braque) invent collage, why in Paris, and why exactly in 1912? Because they were men, artists, geniuses, because they were driven by a creative impulse toward the new (in this case within the novelty of Cubism they had also invented), and because they were doing so in a time and a place that could institutionally recognize their achievement. Or to put it more bluntly: because this has long been how art history taught us how to think about collage and the rules of the game in art in general; a game with winners and losers, with a strong sense of the “tradition of the new,” with no room for craft and amateur work, paying little or no attention to women and those working anonymously or collectively in the sphere of domestic and private life, in short with a sharp awareness of the difference between the unique...
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April 2025
April 01 2025
Fragmentary Forms: a New History of Collage Unavailable
Fragmentary Forms: a New History of Collage
by Freya
Gowrley
. Princeton University Press
, Princeton, NJ, U.S.A.
, 2024
. 402 pp., illus. Hardback. ISBN: 978-0-69-125374-9
.
Jan Baetens
Online ISSN: 1530-9282
Print ISSN: 0024-094X
©2025 ISAST
2025
ISAST
Leonardo (2025) 58 (2): 211–212.
Citation
Jan Baetens; Fragmentary Forms: a New History of Collage. Leonardo 2025; 58 (2): 211–212. doi: https://doi.org/10.1162/leon_r_02663
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