FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

“What art might mean and how it is discussed in a country formed by life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness is Dave Hickey’s big, compelling question. But he doesn’t go at it from afar, from the distant vantage point of theory. Like the best American critics, Hickey sneaks up on the question quick and close.”
Sarah Vowell, Salon

“Dave Hickey is my hero, a great mind driven not by necessity but by desire—erudite, generous, and free. If this book of shocking intelligence and moral hope is read widely and above all well, word for word, it will help the world.”
Peter Schjeldahl

The Invisible Dragon
Essays on Beauty, Revised and Expanded

Dave Hickey

In 1993, Dave Hickey published a sharply opinionated book on art called The Invisible Dragon. It was a small volume, but the response was outsized—and, in many cases, outraged. While artists flocked to it, drawn by its forceful call for attention to beauty, huge numbers of more theoretically oriented professional critics absolutely savaged it, calling Hickey everything from naïve to reactionary.

Sixteen years later, Hickey’s back—and time hasn’t dulled his edge. With this new edition of The Invisible Dragon, Hickey has both revised and dramatically expanded his controversial book, addressing his critics and supporters both, while simultaneously placing the book—and the reactions it provoked—firmly in the context of larger cultural battles of the time. Bringing the works of Warhol, Raphael, Caravaggio, and Mapplethorpe to bear on the current situation of contemporary art, museum culture, and art criticism, Hickey argues powerfully for a renewed attention to the inherently democratic—and thus essential—concept of beauty. Writing with a liveliness and excitement rarely seen in serious criticism, Hickey invests The Invisible Dragon with the passion and drama that lie at the heart of great art.

Dave Hickey writes cultural criticism. He is former executive editor of Art in America. He has served as a contributing editor for the Village Voice and as the arts editor of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

 

Dave Hickey is available for interviews. For more information, please contact Levi Stahl at (773) 702-0289 or lstahl@press.uchicago.edu

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