Theory of the Image

By: Thomas Nail

Narrated by: Doug McDonald

We live in an age of the mobile image. The world today is absolutely saturated with images of all kinds circulating around the world at an incredible rate. The movement of the image has never been more extraordinary than it is today. This recent kinetic revolution of the image has enormous consequences not only for the way we think about contemporary art and aesthetics but also for art history as well.

Responding to this historical moment, Theory of the Image offers a fresh new theory and history of art from the perspective of this epoch-defining mobility. The image has been understood in many ways, but it is rarely understood to be fundamentally in motion. The original and materialist approach is what defines Theory of the Image and what allows it to offer the first kinetic history of the Western art tradition. In this audiobook, Thomas Nail further develops his larger philosophy of movement into a comprehensive "kinesthetic" of the moving image from prehistory to the present. The audiobook concludes with a vivid analysis of the contemporary digital image and its hybridity, ultimately outlining new territory for research and exploration across aesthetics, art history, cultural theory, and media studies.

The book is published by Oxford University Press. The audiobook is published by University Press Audiobooks.

©2019 Oxford University Press (P)2020 Redwood Audiobooks

Critic reviews

"This is an engaging book with a fascinating argument." (David Morgan, Duke University)

"Thomas Nail's Theory of the Image is an ambitious and original attempt to re-theorize the material and cognitive dynamics of the image." (John Roberts, University of Wolverhampton)