All About Process

In recent years, many prominent and successful artists have claimed that their primary concern is not the artwork they produce but the artistic process itself. In this volume, Kim Grant analyzes this idea and traces its historical roots, showing how changing concepts of artistic process have played a dominant role in the development of modern and contemporary art.This astute account of the ways in which process has been understood and addressed examines canonical artists such as Monet, Cézanne, Matisse, and De Kooning, as well as philosophers and art theorists such as Henri Focillon, R. G. Collingwood, and John Dewey. Placing “process art” within a larger historical context, Grant looks at the changing relations of the artist’s labor to traditional craftsmanship and industrial production, the status of art as a commodity, the increasing importance of the body and materiality in art making, and the nature and significance of the artist’s role in modern society. In doing so, she shows how process is an intrinsic part of aesthetic theory that connects to important contemporary debates about work, craft, and labor.Comprehensive and insightful, this synthetic study of process in modern and contemporary art reveals how artists’ explicit engagement with the concept fits into a broader narrative of the significance of art in the industrial and postindustrial world.

“This book is essential for libraries supporting graduate programs in art history or curatorial studies and is recommended for schools of art and design.”—Ian McDermott, ARLIS/NA Reviews, “This is an elegant, clear text that will serve as an excellent primer for anyone interested in the histories of thinking about making and the artistic process. Art students as well as students of aesthetics and history of art will benefit from its careful, thoughtful synthesis of an array of complex, foundational texts pertaining to the theme of ‘process’ and making.”—Jo Applin, author of Yayoi Kusama: Infinity Mirror Room—Phalli’s Field, “All About Process brings a wealth of art-historical knowledge and perceptive theoretical insight to analyze the crucial but elusive concept of artistic process and makes a powerful argument for its importance, not simply as an indispensable tool for creating more interesting art objects but as part of the essence of art itself. Kim Grant’s book provides a welcome resource for resisting the forces of commodification while closing the gap between art and life.”—Richard Shusterman, author of Thinking Through the Body: Essays in Somaesthetics

Kim Grant is Associate Professor of Art History and Chair of the Department of Art at the University of Southern Maine. She is the author of Surrealism and the Visual Arts: Theory and Reception.