Explores the artistic practices that employ evocation - the calling forth of past emotions, desires, frustrations, and memories - as a mode of connecting past and present. Featuring the work of artists working in a variety of media, this book challenges the conventional approach to history whereby the past is kept at a distance as historical fact.

This engaging publication explores the artistic practices that employ evocation--the calling forth of past emotions, desires, frustrations, and memories into the present--as a mode of connecting past and present. Featuring the work of emerging artists working in a variety of media, including Ronnie Bass, Kajsa Dahlberg, Tellervo Kalleinen and Oliver Kochta-Kalleinen, Fikret Atay, Katerina Seda, Maryam Jafri, and Johanna Billing, as well as films by Keren Cytter, Kevin Willmott, and Jennifer Phang, the book challenges the conventional approach to history whereby the past is kept at a distance as historical fact. Ranging from playful to haunting, the artworks presented here rupture conventional notions of time to alter the dynamic of the present moment and enhance the possibilities for radical change on both a personal and sociopolitical scale.

Distributed for the Whitney Museum of American Art

Exhibition Schedule:

The Kitchen, New York (opens 5/22/09)