no 54

A Thing of Beauty is

by Michael Petry

Published 29 May 1997
This profile of art and design explores beauty as a cultural construct, looking both at its more positive historical associations and how it functions today in relation to artworks in the global media age. With contributions from a host of artists and writers including Orlan, Barbara Bloom, Michael Craig-Martin, Hiroshi Sugimoto and Per Barclay, the book will ask if anything can be allowed to be beautiful again, and if so, what does it mean for art perceived in an ugly age, and in relation to artworks in the global media age.