Their Common Sense

by Molly Nesbit

At first glance, Their Common Sense looks like a social history of early abstract art, but critic Molly Nesbit quickly goes beyond, turning this feast for the eyes and the mind into an exploration of the genesis of mass culture. Taking the period between 1880 and 1925 as her subject, Nesbit links the emergence of modernism with universal education in public schools, asking basic questions about the consequences of an education. In Their Common Sense, the author tackles problems often discussed by contemporary theorists, but she has a way of expressing them that keeps historical voices alive, spoken, still beautiful, still subversive. With moments of poetry, aphorism and theater, this is a book conceived to be seen as well as read. 7 x 9 inches, 151 b&w reproductions.

376 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published June 1, 2000

Reviews

[Katie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This took forever to read. I liked it very much, most of the time. Sometimes I felt her writing style was a little too lyric for its own good. I'm still not sure what she exactly means by "common sense" but she does an impressive job of tracing it through language, Duchamp, advertising, and the advent of cinema. Passages like this one about Charlie Chaplan are pretty great:

"This face, which could never be held in a hand or touched, was sheer affect, crystal light. It compensated for the perpetually incomplete. The insanity of its form would cease to be disturbing. This face did not have to think or mean. It met with great applause."