Retrospection and Revision in Modern and Contemporary Art, Literature and Music

This interdisciplinary book investigates the various ways in which North American and European modern and contemporary artists, authors, and musicians have returned to earlier works of their own, engaging in inventive revivals and transformations of the past in the present. The book is distinctive in its focus on such revisits, as well as in the diversity of art forms under review: in addition to visual art, the book explores fiction, poetry, literary criticism, film, rock music, and philosophy. This scope, together with the time-span covered in the book, from the 1850s to the twenty-first century, allows for a broad view on retrospection and revision. The case studies presented here offer a multifaceted exploration of the widely different goals to which practitioners of the arts have made retrospection and revision functional against the background of cultural, social, political, and personal forces. Acknowledgments Contents Notes on Contributors List of Figures Introduction: Retrospection and Revision in Contemporary Art, Literature, and Music References Retrospection and Memory Stepping in the Same River Twice: Péter Forgács and the Revisiting of the Danube Exodus Introduction Found Footage of Two River Voyages The Comparability of the Holocaust A Different Kind of Multidirectionality The Space In-Between References Uwe Timm and the Ghosts of the Past—A Writer’s Ethical Impact on the Agenda of Collective Memory References Australia and Morocco Revisited: The Materialized Travel Memories of Dutch Visual Artist Theo Kuijpers Materialized Travel Memories Early Career and Work Revisiting Australia and Morocco Conclusion References Revision, Politics, and Ideology The Fall and Rise of Exile’s Return: Malcolm Cowley and the Cultural Politics of Revision Exile’s Return: A Narrative of Ideas (1934) Exile’s Return: A Literary Odyssey of the 1920s (1951) References Revision, Change, and the Native American Oral Tradition in Louise Erdrich’s Love Medicine(s) The Native American Renaissance Love Medicine (1984): From “Revised and Expanded” (1993) to “Newly Revised” (2009) Revision and the Question of Authorial Intention Louise Erdrich, (Re)writing, and the Native American Oral Tradition Conclusion References An Old Man Looking from the Window: Camille Pissarro, the Tuileries Garden Paintings, and Turning Points in His Career Late Style? Looking Back in Anger Anarchism and the Remnants of Royalty Money as a Driving Force References Revisiting and Control: The Artist’s Legacy Retrospective Anticipation: Georgia O’Keeffe’s Efforts at Controlling Her Legacy A Woman Artist Dealing with Stieglitz’s Legacy The Whitney Museum Retrospective Looking Back at Her Life and Work A Museum of Her Own Conclusion References Replaying the Past: Belgian Pop Band dEUS’s Return to Early Work “Let’s Be Done with the Old Stuff”: The Band’s Perspective “An Excellent Way to Feel Old”: The Fans’ Perspective Concluding Remarks References Confessin’ the Blues: The Rolling Stones’s Revisit of Their Musical Roots Introduction British Sonic Roots Canonizing the Blues Confession The Sonic “Confession” of The Rolling Stones The Visual “Confession” of The Rolling Stones Conclusion Coda References Artists’ Haunts: Late Artists Revisiting Their Work Beyond Their Time Varieties of Spirit Art Phantom Artists and Frauds During the Belle Époque Spirit Art and Sanity in the Age of the Avant-Garde Artist’s Haunts in the Thompson Case The Twilight Between Fact and Fiction Conclusion: Revisiting as Aesthetic Vampirism References Transformation and Change in Late Work Space, Time, and Change in Claude Monet’s Late Paintings Cathedrals and Haystacks “Late Style” and the Nymphéa Paintings A New Conception of Painting Water Mirrors Monet’s Way of Painting Monet’s Conception of Space Contrasts “Bad-Light” Situations Processes Involving the Viewer Existential Meanings Closing Remarks References Winter Is Coming: The Voice of Spring by Lawrence Alma-Tadema (1910) The Seasonal (Re)cycle Life and Death Creation and Demise Visions of the Past References The Passage of Time: Jasper Johns’s The Seasons (1985–86) and 5 Postcards (2011) The Seasons Passage of Time Art Historical Motifs Recurring Motifs Change and Renewal 5 Postcards Cycle Ars Longa, Vita Brevis References Creation, Aging, and the Prospect of Death Endpapers: Adrienne Rich’s Signature to Her Life Reading Her Own Handwriting Signified by Sickness Locked Down by a Hand References Jean Le Gac: Auto-Reflexive Artist First Phase The Painter Short Biography Vocation Art History Second Phase Full-Time Artist Distance from the Art World Not the Art World, but Art Third Phase Repertoire Musée Jean Le Gac Escaping Oblivion Closing Remarks Notes References Yielding to Touch: Simon Hantaï’s Late Reactivations of Pliage From Surrealism to Pliage Retreat from Public Directing Interpretation Cutting, Reframing, and the Abject Mechanical and Digital Reworkings Burying, Unearthing, (Dis)embodiment, Germination Touching Through the Enfolding of Conversational Partners Defying Closure References CODA: Encore—Notes on Lacan’s Reference to Mysticism in the Late Seminars “A Discourse That Might Not Be a Semblance” A Discourse That Might Not Be Mystical Other Jouissance Not a Matter of “Cum” References Index