Cases of Citation: On Literature in Art

Cases of citation presents a history of artists who incorporated literary references into their work from the 1960s onwards. Through a series of object-focused chapters that each take up a singular ‘case of citation’, the collection considers how literary citation emerged as a viable and urgent strategy for artists during this period. It surveys nine artworks by a diverse group of artists – including David Wojnarowicz, Lis Rhodes, Romare Bearden and Silvia Kolbowski – whose citations draw on literary works with authors ranging from Gertrude Stein to Jean Genet. The book also features an interview with pioneering feminist artist Elaine Reichek that discusses her career-long commitment to working with text. Together, the artworks and cited texts are approached from various critical angles, with each author questioning and complicating the ways in which we can ‘read’ textual citations in art.

Table of Contents:
Introduction Cases of citation: On literature in art – Michael Green, Matthew Holman, Chloë Julius Citations after the death of the author – Chloë Julius Part I: Hauntings and returns 1 Gothic: The return of the repressed – Laurie Rojas 2 ‘Was there anything so real as words?’ Allen Ruppersberg’s The Picture of Dorian Gray – Jennie Waldow 3 That monster – Ivan Knapp Part II: Collage and influence 4 ‘Swarming city, city gorged with dreams’: Sound, sight and text in Paris Blues – Kalvin Schmidt-Rimpler Dinh 5 ‘Criminal, loner, drifter’: metonymic citation in the collages of David Wojnarowicz – Louis Shankar 6 A language of recalcitrance: Lis Rhodes, Gertrude Stein, and syntactical play – Hannah Kahng Part III: Transformation and substance 7 'What, I wonder, does love have to do with an irregular rectangle?' On Words & Drawings by Mario Schifano and Frank O’Hara (1964) – Matthew Holman 8 ‘My Funny Verlainetine’: Queer citations in Ray Johnson’s mail art – Brian Leahy 9 ‘Written honour’: Wagner, Beuys, and Stendhal in Marcel Broodthaers’s Magie: art et politique – Andrew Chesher Part IIII: Between the Needle and the Book 10 Elaine Reichek in conversation with Michael Green and Chloë Julius Index

About the Author :
Chloë Julius is a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow at the University of Nottingham Michael Green is an independent scholar and works in arts publishing Matthew Holman is a Lecturer in English Literature at the University of Hertfordshire