The Future of the Image

The book by philosopher Jacques Rancière shows a new concept of the image in contemporary art, demonstrating how art and politics have always been intrinsically intertwined. Covering a range of art movements, filmmakers such as Godard and Bresson, and thinkers such as Foucault, Deleuze, Adorno, Barthes, Lyotard and Greenberg, Rancière claims that contemporary theorists of the image are suffering from religious tendencies. He argues that there is a stark political choice in art: it can either reinforce a radical democracy, or create a new reactionary mysticism.