Art from Start to Finish

by Becker, Howard Saul

• ISBN13: 9780226040851
• ISBN10: 0226040852
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2006-06-15
• Publisher: Univ of Chicago Pr

Summary

When is an artistic work finished? When the copyeditor makes the final correction to a manuscript, when the composer writes the last note of a symphony, or when the painter puts the last brushstroke on the canvas? Perhaps it's even later, when someone reads the work, when an ensemble performs, or when the painting is hung on a gallery wall for viewing? Art from Start to Finish gathers a unique group of contributors from the worlds of sociology, musicology, literature, and communicationsmany of them practicing artists in their own rightto discuss how artists from jazz musicians to painters work: how they coordinate their efforts, how they think, how they start, and, of course, how they finish their productions. Specialists in the arts have much to say about the works themselves, which are often neglected by scholarsi n other fields. Art from Start to Finish takes a different tack by exploring the creative process itself and its social component. Any reader who makes art or has an interest in it will value this book.

Author Biography

Howard S. Becker is the author of several books including, most recently, Tricks of the Trade, also published by the University of Chicago Press. He lives and works in San Francisco, California. Robert R. Faulkner is professor of sociology at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. He is the author of Music on Demand and Hollywood Studio Musicians. Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett is professor of performance studies at New York University. She is the author of Destination Culture.

Table of Contents

Foreword	ix
Stanley Katz
Preface	xiii
Howard S. Becker
Robert R. Faulkner
Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett
Editors' Introduction	1	(20)
Howard S. Becker
Robert R. Faulkner
Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett
The Work Itself	21	(10)
Howard S. Becker
Profiles of the Unfinished: Rodin's Work and the Varieties of Incompleteness	31	(38)
Pierre-Michel Menger
``How do I know I am Finnish?'' The Computer, the Archive, the Literary Artist, and the Work as Social Object	69	(22)
Michael Joyce
Shedding Culture	91	(27)
Robert R. Faulkner
This Is What I Do	118	(8)
Scott Deveaux
Grasping Shona Musical Works: A Case Study of Mbira Music	126	(9)
Paul Berliner
Economic Analysis and Steps toward Completing the Work	135	(14)
Richard E. Caves
The Fragment Itself	149	(9)
Larry Gross
Object / Shadows---Notes on a Developing Art Form	158	(15)
Larry Kagan
``This is a stone from the endless beach'': An Interview with Max Gimblett	173	(27)
Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett
Art Works	200	(16)
Michael D. Harris
Wallace Stevens's Jar	216	(13)
Bruce Jackson
List of Contributors	229	(2)
Index	231