Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611

  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Plastics

Plastics

Joselit, David
Fowler, Caroline
Gunnison, Anne

Paperback

Series: Art/Work

Art HistoryConservation & PreservationEnvironmental Studies

ISBN10: 0691238820
ISBN13: 9780691238821
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Published: Nov 11 2025
Pages: 160
Weight: 1.25
Height: 0.60 Width: 7.10 Depth: 9.00
Language: English

Why modern and contemporary art--and art conservation--can't be understood without taking account of the revolutionary impact of plastics

Modern and contemporary art wouldn't exist without the invention of plastics. From sculpture to paint, and photography to film, plastics have shaped every major medium of art. In turn, plastics have revolutionized art conservation, transforming the possibilities of preservation but also producing new challenges for conservators struggling to preserve toxic and degrading material. Hailed as utopian in the twentieth century, plastics today are often understood as pollution and waste--a central cause of ecological crisis. Plastics is the first book to address the multifaceted history of plastics from the perspective of artists, art historians, conservators, and environmental scientists.

Plastics demonstrates that this material cannot easily be summarized as toxic or utopian, catastrophic or necessary. Instead, plastics define the modern world in both its possibility and failures. The book also reveals how artists have been a critical overlooked voice in debates about plastics, and how they have offered theories of the material through works that explore its potential and harmfulness.

Presenting a variety of perspectives on the world of plastics through the lens of art, artmaking, art history, and art conservation, Plastics shows why and how coming to terms with this material is critical to understanding not only modern and contemporary art and art conservation but also the crises of the twenty-first century.

Also in

Conservation & Preservation

View All