A brilliant and refreshing plea for the enduring relevance of a modernist ideal The idea of the autonomy of the art object seems to have disappeared into the annals of modernism. Today our primary concern is to show how art and its institutions are socially determined, that art no longer operates in a separate sphere of its own. Sven Lütticken’s ambitious study seeks to test such assumptions, arguing that the concept of autonomy retains its conceptual and political purchase. Bringing together a wide range of thinkers (from Theodor W. Adorno to Aimé Césaire, Friedrich Schiller to Andrea Fraser, Peter Bürger to Elizabeth Povinelli) and covering a broad set of themes (from German Idealism to institutional history and media theory), this critical reader foregrounds autonomy as something dynamic, offering an essential introduction to the field while leading the debates in fresh directions.

Sven Lütticken (born 1971) is the author of Secret Publicity, Idols of the Market, History in Motion and Cultural Revolution , all published by Sternberg Press.