Books by Roni Grén
This study concentrates on the discourses around animal death in arts and the ways they changed o... more This study concentrates on the discourses around animal death in arts and the ways they changed over time.
Chapter topics span from religious symbolism to natural history cabinets, from hunting laws to animal rights, from economic history to formalist views on art. In other words, the book asks why artists have represented animal death in visual culture, maintaining that the practice has, through the whole era, been a crucial part of the understanding of our relation to the world and our identity as humans. This is the first truly integrative book-length examination of the depiction of dead animals in Western art.
The book will be of interest to scholars working in art history, animal studies, and cultural history.
The book examines the importance of the animal in modern art theory, using classic texts of moder... more The book examines the importance of the animal in modern art theory, using classic texts of modern aesthetics and texts written by modern artists to explore the influence of the human-animal relationship on nineteenth and twentieth century artists and art theorists. It focuses on the concept of the animal, rather than on images of animals, and it aims towards a theoretical account of the connections between the notions of art and animality in the modern age.
Papers by Roni Grén
Niin & näin 4/2020, 2020
In Finnish. Article discussing Eli Lotar's "Aux abattoirs de la Villette" in connection with Geor... more In Finnish. Article discussing Eli Lotar's "Aux abattoirs de la Villette" in connection with Georges Bataille's views on eating meat.
Vuonna 1929 ranskalaisessa Documents-lehdessä julkaistiin kolme Eli Lotarin (1905-1969) ottamaa reportaasikuvaa Pariisin Villetten teurastamolta. Niiden yhteydessä ilmestyi Georges Bataillen (1897-1962) teksti "Teurastamo". Yhdessä ne avaavat ikkunan Bataillen käsityksiin ihmisen ja eläimen välisestä rajasta sekä lihantuotannon ongelmista. Samalla valkenee, kuinka aiemmissa tätä aineistoa koskevissa tulkinnoissa on tavattu ohittaa eläimyyden rajaa ja lihansyöntiä koskevat kysymykset.
Synteesi 1–2/2020, 2020
In Finnish. The article discusses the nature of the theories on anamorphosis presented from 1950s... more In Finnish. The article discusses the nature of the theories on anamorphosis presented from 1950s to 1980s amidst the structuralist paradigms in France. It problematizes the idea that anamorphosis is and was an anti-Cartesian gesture. This it does by comparing the theories by Jurgis Baltrušaitis, Jacques Lacan, Roland Barthes, and Jean-François Lyotard to discussions considering the use of perspective and anamorphosis in Académie française in the 17th century.
Tahiti, 2020
Article on Carl Einstein's "Negerplastik" and "L'enfance néolithique". Discusses over the histori... more Article on Carl Einstein's "Negerplastik" and "L'enfance néolithique". Discusses over the historiographic place of Africa in Einstein's writings on art. In Finnish.
In Finnish. An article on the objectivist and scientific tendencies in two scandalous works by Em... more In Finnish. An article on the objectivist and scientific tendencies in two scandalous works by Emmanuel Frémiet.
In Finnish. An article on the connections of evolutionary theories and theories about synaesthesi... more In Finnish. An article on the connections of evolutionary theories and theories about synaesthesia related to arts between 1870 and 1920.
Article in Finnish. English summary:
Georges Bataille, Manet, and the Birth of Modern Art
What ... more Article in Finnish. English summary:
Georges Bataille, Manet, and the Birth of Modern Art
What was at stake when French writer Georges Bataille (1897-1962) declared that Édouard Manet was the originator of modern art? And what kind of vision of modernity was inherent in the discourse Bataille was producing? In this article, I will be arguing that the Bataille's view of the questions, often misrepresented, was tightly woven into the philosophical and art historical context of his time. Actually, he made Manet’s art a propagator of an aesthetics of confusion that was almost Surrealist in its method. Bataille’s arguments had as their targets the phenomenological interpretations of art (on a philosophical level), the existentialist cultural policy (on a political level), and the questions raised about the birth of modern art in the art historical works of André Malraux (on a historiographical level). Thus, the conversation was condensed around the questions of self-consciousness (in relation to Hegelianism of his time), of artistic signification and its utility (in relation to the romantic view of artistic revolution), and of the primacy of vision.
Published in Synteesi 1/2013. Helsinki: Suomen Semiotiikan Seura 2013.
A revised essay written originally for a conference booklet in 2010. An attempt to clarify George... more A revised essay written originally for a conference booklet in 2010. An attempt to clarify Georges Bataille’s and Aby Warburg’s reasons for avoiding interpretations in their late art historical works.
Original version published in the conference booklet Continuity and Its Discontents: Many Histories of Art. Turku: Summer School of The Finnish Doctoral School of Art History. 2010.
Book Reviews by Roni Grén
Tahiti, 2021
Book review: Philippe Dagen, Primitivismes: Une invention moderne (Paris: Gallimard, 2019) & Phil... more Book review: Philippe Dagen, Primitivismes: Une invention moderne (Paris: Gallimard, 2019) & Philippe Dagen, Primitivismes 2: Une guerre moderne (Paris: Gallimard, 2021).
Trace, 2021
Book review of Nathaniel Wolloch, The Enlightenment’s Animals. Changing Conceptions of Animals in... more Book review of Nathaniel Wolloch, The Enlightenment’s Animals. Changing Conceptions of Animals in the Long 18th Century (Amsterdam University Press, 2019). In Finnish.
Ennen ja nyt 3/2020, 2020
In Finnish. Book Review of Rémi Labrusse, Prehistoire: l’envers du temps. Paris: Éditions Hazan, ... more In Finnish. Book Review of Rémi Labrusse, Prehistoire: l’envers du temps. Paris: Éditions Hazan, 2019 & Cécile Debray, Rémi Labrusse and Maria Stavrinaki, dir. Préhistoire: une énigme moderne, Paris: Éditions du Centre Pompidou, 2019.
Tahiti, 2019
Book review of Marc Bruet, "Grotte Chauvet – Géants de pierre. Essai" (Paris: L’Harmattan, 2018).
Tahiti, 2017
Book review of Thierry de Duve, Essais datés, vol. 1 Duchampiana. Genève: Musée d'art moderne et ... more Book review of Thierry de Duve, Essais datés, vol. 1 Duchampiana. Genève: Musée d'art moderne et contemporain, 2014 & Essais datés, vol. 2 – Adresses (Genève: Musée d' art moderne et contemporain, 2016).
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Books by Roni Grén
Chapter topics span from religious symbolism to natural history cabinets, from hunting laws to animal rights, from economic history to formalist views on art. In other words, the book asks why artists have represented animal death in visual culture, maintaining that the practice has, through the whole era, been a crucial part of the understanding of our relation to the world and our identity as humans. This is the first truly integrative book-length examination of the depiction of dead animals in Western art.
The book will be of interest to scholars working in art history, animal studies, and cultural history.
Doctoral Dissertation. In Finnish. Discusses Georges Bataille’s views on art and art history: the values of art and the sense of art history. Turku: Turun yliopisto 2012 Available in http://www.doria.fi/handle/10024/86147
Papers by Roni Grén
Vuonna 1929 ranskalaisessa Documents-lehdessä julkaistiin kolme Eli Lotarin (1905-1969) ottamaa reportaasikuvaa Pariisin Villetten teurastamolta. Niiden yhteydessä ilmestyi Georges Bataillen (1897-1962) teksti "Teurastamo". Yhdessä ne avaavat ikkunan Bataillen käsityksiin ihmisen ja eläimen välisestä rajasta sekä lihantuotannon ongelmista. Samalla valkenee, kuinka aiemmissa tätä aineistoa koskevissa tulkinnoissa on tavattu ohittaa eläimyyden rajaa ja lihansyöntiä koskevat kysymykset.
Georges Bataille, Manet, and the Birth of Modern Art
What was at stake when French writer Georges Bataille (1897-1962) declared that Édouard Manet was the originator of modern art? And what kind of vision of modernity was inherent in the discourse Bataille was producing? In this article, I will be arguing that the Bataille's view of the questions, often misrepresented, was tightly woven into the philosophical and art historical context of his time. Actually, he made Manet’s art a propagator of an aesthetics of confusion that was almost Surrealist in its method. Bataille’s arguments had as their targets the phenomenological interpretations of art (on a philosophical level), the existentialist cultural policy (on a political level), and the questions raised about the birth of modern art in the art historical works of André Malraux (on a historiographical level). Thus, the conversation was condensed around the questions of self-consciousness (in relation to Hegelianism of his time), of artistic signification and its utility (in relation to the romantic view of artistic revolution), and of the primacy of vision.
Published in Synteesi 1/2013. Helsinki: Suomen Semiotiikan Seura 2013.
Original version published in the conference booklet Continuity and Its Discontents: Many Histories of Art. Turku: Summer School of The Finnish Doctoral School of Art History. 2010.
Book Reviews by Roni Grén
Chapter topics span from religious symbolism to natural history cabinets, from hunting laws to animal rights, from economic history to formalist views on art. In other words, the book asks why artists have represented animal death in visual culture, maintaining that the practice has, through the whole era, been a crucial part of the understanding of our relation to the world and our identity as humans. This is the first truly integrative book-length examination of the depiction of dead animals in Western art.
The book will be of interest to scholars working in art history, animal studies, and cultural history.
Doctoral Dissertation. In Finnish. Discusses Georges Bataille’s views on art and art history: the values of art and the sense of art history. Turku: Turun yliopisto 2012 Available in http://www.doria.fi/handle/10024/86147
Vuonna 1929 ranskalaisessa Documents-lehdessä julkaistiin kolme Eli Lotarin (1905-1969) ottamaa reportaasikuvaa Pariisin Villetten teurastamolta. Niiden yhteydessä ilmestyi Georges Bataillen (1897-1962) teksti "Teurastamo". Yhdessä ne avaavat ikkunan Bataillen käsityksiin ihmisen ja eläimen välisestä rajasta sekä lihantuotannon ongelmista. Samalla valkenee, kuinka aiemmissa tätä aineistoa koskevissa tulkinnoissa on tavattu ohittaa eläimyyden rajaa ja lihansyöntiä koskevat kysymykset.
Georges Bataille, Manet, and the Birth of Modern Art
What was at stake when French writer Georges Bataille (1897-1962) declared that Édouard Manet was the originator of modern art? And what kind of vision of modernity was inherent in the discourse Bataille was producing? In this article, I will be arguing that the Bataille's view of the questions, often misrepresented, was tightly woven into the philosophical and art historical context of his time. Actually, he made Manet’s art a propagator of an aesthetics of confusion that was almost Surrealist in its method. Bataille’s arguments had as their targets the phenomenological interpretations of art (on a philosophical level), the existentialist cultural policy (on a political level), and the questions raised about the birth of modern art in the art historical works of André Malraux (on a historiographical level). Thus, the conversation was condensed around the questions of self-consciousness (in relation to Hegelianism of his time), of artistic signification and its utility (in relation to the romantic view of artistic revolution), and of the primacy of vision.
Published in Synteesi 1/2013. Helsinki: Suomen Semiotiikan Seura 2013.
Original version published in the conference booklet Continuity and Its Discontents: Many Histories of Art. Turku: Summer School of The Finnish Doctoral School of Art History. 2010.
Presented in EAM 2014 Conference, Utopia. European Network for Avant-Garde and Modernism Studies. Helsinki 31.8.2014.
Presented in Eläintutkimuspäivät: Finnish Society for Human-Animal Studies. Turku: Turun yliopisto 25.4.2013.
Presented in Image=Gesture: the 5th Nomadikon Meeting. Bergen 9.11.2011.