This is a book of essays, only seemingly miscellaneous. It seeks and effectively finds a deep integration of diverse themes and movements in both art and politics, and it does so with sensibility and analytical power and an eloquence of style. How does the visual relate to dissent against the state? Can art and literature straddle both autonomy and solidarity? With what attitudes to violence is it possible to visually represent a whole empire based on the political economy of mining and a nation that comes out from under its shadow? By what gradual alchemies do philosophical traditions of taste in the eighteenth century give way to the thrusting innovations of the avant-garde some two centuries later? With what creative pride does the art and mind of the Southern periphery refuse the offer to merely play 'catch up' with the trends and frameworks of the metropolitan North? These are some of the questions Daniel Herwitz illuminatingly traverses with his wide knowledge, his lively intelligence, and his impressive cosmopolitan reach. A work of sustaining interest and instructive insight.

Akeel Bilgrami, Sidney Morgenbesser Professor of Philosophy, Columbia University, USA

Uniquely and equally at home in political and formal analysis, Daniel Herwitz is at his uniform best in this book. Its breadth and subtlety of argument advance the central claim that the political achievements of art-- unlike celebrity-- increase the more it engages with the world and defers on the claim of its own importance.

Michael P. Steinberg, Barnaby Conrad and Mary Critchfield Keeney Professor of History, Brown University, USA

Daniel Herwitz’s new book is a testament to an author who can think in the present for the present. Its insight into contemporary art’s contribution to the political machinations and uncertainties of our times is subtly worked through a carefully selected range of artists, critics, and philosophers. It is a model for a new philosophical art criticism that must look today beyond the staid geographical landlines of enquiry.

Lydia Goehr, Professor of Philosophy, Columbia University, USA