Art/Commons

Art/Commons is the first book to theorise the commons from the perspectives of contemporary art history and anthropology, focusing on the ongoing tensions between art and capitalism. This study is grounded in an analysis of contemporary artistic and curatorial practices, which the author describes as practices of commoning, based on co-production, participation, mutualism and the valorization of reproductive labour. Mollona proposes a novel theoretical approach to current debates on the commons, and shows that art can provide both a language of anti-capitalist and post-colonial critique as well as a distinctive set of skills and practices of commoning.

Massimiliano Mollona is a writer, filmmaker and anthropologist with a multidisciplinary background in economics and anthropology. Mollona has been the director of the Athens Biennale (2015-17), one of the artistic directors of the Bergen Assembly (2017); co-founder of the Laboratory for the Urban Commons (LUC) based in Athens and the initiator of the ongoing project Institute of Radical Imagination (IRI). He is currently a Senior Lecturer in Anthropology at Goldsmiths, University of London, UK.

Introduction Part I: Anthropology, Art and Political Economy 1. The Allure of Abstraction 2. Labour, Art and Slavery 3. Art and Commoning: A Short History Part II: Projects 4. Participatory Films 5. Curatorial Projects 6. Institute of Radical Imagination Conclusion