Thinking with Things: Toward a New Vision of Art

by Esther Pasztory

What is "art"? Why have human societies through all time and around the globe created those objects we call works of art? Is there any way of defining art that can encompass everything from Paleolithic objects to the virtual images created by the latest computer technology? Questions such as these have preoccupied Esther Pasztory since the beginning of her scholarly career. In this authoritative volume, she distills four decades of research and reflection to propose a pathbreaking new way of understanding what art is and why human beings create it that can be applied to all cultures throughout time. At its heart, Pasztory's thesis is simple and yet profound. She asserts that humans create things (some of which modern Western society chooses to call "art") in order to work out our ideas—that is, we literally think with things. Pasztory draws on examples from many societies to argue that the art-making impulse is primarily cognitive and only secondarily aesthetic. She demonstrates that "art" always reflects the specific social context in which it is created, and that as societies become more complex, their art becomes more rarefied. Pasztory presents her thesis in a two-part approach. The first section of the book is an original essay entitled "Thinking with Things" that develops Pasztory's unified theory of what art is and why we create it. The second section is a collection of eight previously published essays that explore the art-making process in both Pre-Columbian and Western societies. Pasztory's work combines the insights of art history and anthropology in the light of poststructuralist ideas. Her book will be indispensable reading for everyone who creates or thinks about works of art.

Genres: Nonfiction, Art, Anthropology

264 pages, Paperback

First published August 1, 2005

Reviews

[Giovanni García-Fenech · Rating 5 out of 5]

Every once in a while you're lucky to find a book that teaches you how to look at the world differently. I'm adding Esther Pasztory's Thinking with Things to this very short list.

Pasztory shows you how to shed your internalized assumptions about non-Western art and opens your eyes to issues you wouldn't have come up with on your own, such as the impact of written language on the status of art and the reasons why some groups painted in caves while others made masks or carved monuments. She also explains why it took so long to appreciate the artistic achievements of Pre-Columbian Peru as opposed to the works of the Mayans. And you'll learn why realistic representations are not an evolution from abstract representations--and why they're not even more accurate. You'll never see works in a museum the same way again.

[Wes Christensen · Rating 5 out of 5]

A collection of writing by a great art historian of Precolumbian culture and art. Her book on Aztec Art is great, and this one is fascinating for its breadth and depth -- talking as she does about the meanings of so called "primitive" art, the conclusions she draws are directly applicable to our world today. (Strange as that might seem). Very subtle writing, critically acute and memorable.

[yael · Rating 3 out of 5]

i felt this book never really quite got off the ground. i was waiting/expecting something provocative, but i don't feel like she got there. i found her discussion of the ideas that led up to her writing this book (i saw her present a paper) much more stimulating than the book itself.

[Gloria · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read the chapters that were most relevant to my work/interests, that is those more centered on her general approach and found them very helpful. Didn't read the second half.