For a recent review in CAA reviews, Matthew Rampley discusses Transfixed by Prehistory: An Inquiry into Modern and Art and Time by Maria Stavrinaki (tr. Jane Marie Todd). Click here to learn more about the book. Click here to read the full review. An excerpt appears below:
“As humans were confronted with the possibility of nuclear annihilation, prehistoric art and culture could provide a potent focus for speculation about the origins and fate of the human species… Current conditions of war in eastern Europe notwithstanding, the greatest threat is the likelihood of environmental and climactic catastrophe. The rise of interest in the Anthropocene parallels the preoccupation with prehistory that has coursed through twentieth-century art and thought. Stavrinaki’s book does us all an inestimable service in highlighting the meanings that have been attributed to it and the motivations that have lain behind them.”