Revival: Memories, Identities, Utopias

Revival: Memories, Identities, Utopias explores the phenomenon of revivalism in art, architecture and design from the nineteenth century to the present. Essays from leading scholars investigate the meanings and impacts of revivalism across a wide array of global contexts. The book?s three sections are prefaced by critical interventions, which consider the significance of ?nostalgia?, ?anachronism? and ?historicism? as philosophical, cultural, and artistic categories that are as productive as they are problematic. A thematic framework invites parallels between apparently disparate projects, such as resurgences of techniques or materials, medievialism, utopian futurism, empire and style, and the persistence of ?neo? in the midst of an ever-urgent quest for originality. Revivalism?s political, religious and economic dimensions are considered from a variety of perspectives, and the differing registers of revivalism are foregrounded in innovative and sophisticated ways. Revival: Memories, Identities, Utopias is the first book to consider these complex processes of historical layering and the stimulating dialogues struck up between materials, objects and ideas that take place across periods and places, often with surprising and controversial results. From Neo-Victorian typography and tattooing to idyllic urban planning and divine revelations, the cultural heft of revivalism is revealed as a constant and paradoxical companion of modernity.