I would like to thank Professor Mark C. Taylor of Columbia University’s Department of Religion and Professor Gregory Amenoff of Columbia University’s School of the Arts, who invited me to present the Bampton Lectures and were enthusiastic and encouraging at every moment. I would also like to thank Alfonso Artiaco, Florence Bonnefous, Darragh Hogan, Renate Kainer, Casey Kaplan, Edouard Merino, Christian Meyer, Taro Nasu, Maureen Paley, Eva Presenhuber, Esther Schipper, and Micheline Szwajcer for their support over the years. Piper Marshall witnessed the development of the lectures and was an incisive critic. Finally, to the students of Columbia University Visual Arts Program between 1997 and 2013, I was and remain deeply impressed.
Parts of this book appeared in the online journal e-flux. I would like to thank Julieta Aranda, Anton Vidokle, and Brian Kuan Wood for their support and dynamic exchange of ideas over the last few years. Other parts appeared in two books of collected essays edited by Paul O’Neill and Mick Wilson. I would particularly like to thank Paul O’Neill for his engagement and critique.
Chapter 1 appeared in a different form as “Contemporary Art Does Not Account for That Which Is Taking Place,”
e-flux 21 (2010).
Chapter 5 appeared in a different form as “ASAP Futures, Not Infinite Future,” in
Curating and the Educational Turn, ed. Paul O’Neill and Mick Wilson (London/Amsterdam: Open Editions/De Appel, 2010).
Chapter 7 appeared in a different form as “Abstract,” in
Micro-Historias y Macro Mundos, vol. 3, ed. Maria Lind (Mexico DF: Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes y Literatura, 2010).
Chapter 9 appeared in a different form as “The Complete Curator,” in
Curating Research, ed. Paul O’Neill and Mick Wilson (London/Amsterdam: Open Editions/De Appel, 2014).
Chapters 13 and
14 appeared in different forms as “Maybe It Would Be Better If We Worked in Groups of Three? Part 1 of 2: The Discursive,”
e-flux 1 (2009); and “Maybe It Would Be Better If We Worked in Groups of Three? Part 2 of 2: The Experimental Factory,”
e-flux 2 (2009).
Chapter 15 appeared in a different form as “The Good of Work,”
e-flux 16 (2010).