MAZADIEGO, Elize (ed.)
Charting space. The cartographies of conceptual art

By the late 1960s cartographic formats and spatial information had become a regular feature in many conceptual artworks. This volume offers a rich study of conceptualisms’ mapping practices that includes more expanded forms of spatial representation.

The book presents 12 in-depth case studies that address artists’ engagement with matters of space at a time when space was garnering new significance in art, theory and culture. The chapters shed fresh light on an evident “spatial turn” that took place from the postwar to the contemporary period, revealing how it was influenced by larger historical, social and cultural contexts. Artists considered include Nancy Holt, Anna Bella Geiger, Gábor Attalai, Raseeh Araeen, Lee Wen, André Cadere, among others.

In addition to raising questions about conceptualism’s relationship to the world, the contributors illustrate how artists’ cartographies served as critical sites for formulating their politics, upsetting prevailing systems and graphing new, heterogenous spaces. [publishers’ note]

With contributions by Eve Kalyva, Alexander Alberro, Jennifer Sarathy, Katalin Cseh-Varga, Christa-Maria Lerm Hayes, Dária Jaremtchuk, Larisa Dryansky, Reiko Tomii, Ann Stephen, Alena J. Williams, Inesa Brasiske, Eva Bentcheva and María José Martinez Sanchez.

“This book releases conceptualism into outer spaces, opening doors to its socio-political and anti-colonial possibilities. The admirable array of writers and artists expands the boundaries far beyond Conceptual Art per se, mapping its controversial definitions and contested histories.”
—Lucy R. Lippard

Published by Manchester University Press, 2023
Art Theory / Conceptual Art