Real places and events are constructed and used to symbolize abstract formulations of power and authority in politics, corporate practice, the arts, religion, and community. By analyzing the aesthetics of public space in contexts both mundane and remarkable, the contributors examine the social relationship between public and private activities that impart meaning to groups of people beyond their individual or local circumstances. From a range of perspectives—anthropological, sociological, and socio-cultural—the contributors discuss road-making in Peru, mass housing in Britain, an unsettling traveling exhibition, and an art fair in London; we explore the meaning of walls in Jerusalem, a Zen garden in Japan, and religious themes in Europe and India. Literally and figuratively, these situations influence the ways in which ordinary people interpret their everyday worlds. By deconstructing the taken for- granted definitions of social value (democracy, equality, individualism, fortune), the authors reveal the ideological role of imagery and imagination in a globalized political context.

"This learned and heavy volume should be placed on the shelves of every art historical library."—E. H. Gombrich, New York Review of Books "This is an engaged and passionate work by a writer with powerful convictions about art, images, aesthetics, the art establishment, and especially the discipline of art history. It is animated by an extraordinary erudition."—Arthur C. Danto, The Art Bulletin "Freedberg's ethnographic and historical range is simply stunning. . . . The Power of Images is an extraordinary critical achievement, exhilarating in its polemic against aesthetic orthodoxy, endlessly fascinating in its details. . . . This is a powerful, disturbing book."—T. J. Jackson Lears, Wilson Quarterly "Freedberg helps us to see that one cannot do justice to the images of art unless one recognizes in them the entire range of human responses, from the lowly impulses prevailing in popular imagery to their refinement in the great visions of the ages."—Rudolf Arnheim, Times Literary Supplement

The book is dedicated to the role of visual representations in the history of early modern science. It brings together historical case studies from various fields and discusses epistemological questions such as the role of images as mediatory instances between practical and theoretical knowledge, the interaction between images and texts, and the potential of images to synthesize fragments of knowledge to a global picture.

Kimberley art: strong in country and law - Kimberley languages - Figurative art of the North-west and Central Kimberley - Paddy Jaminji and the Gurirr Gurirr - The East Kimberley aesthetic - Art of Fitzroy Crossing - Art of Balgo - Kimberley art and material culture - Materials and techniques of the contemporary Kimberley artist.

In Latin America, where even today writing has remained a restricted form of expression, the task of generating consent and imposing the emergent nation-state as the exclusive form of the political, was largely conferred to the image. Furthermore, at the moment of its historical demise, the new, 'postmodern' forms of sovereignty appear to rely even more heavily on visual discourses of power. However, a critique of the iconography of the modern state-form has been missing. This volume is the first concerted attempt by cultural, historical and visual scholars to address the political dimension of visual culture in Latin America, in a comparative perspective spanning various regions and historical stages. The case studies are divided into four sections, analysing the formation of a public sphere, the visual politics of avant-garde art, the impact of mass society on political iconography, and the consolidation and crisis of territory as a key icon of the state.

The Assyrians have usually been charcterized as the strongmen of the ancient Near East, controlling their empire largely through military force, terror, and intimidatin. The new interpretation of Esarhaddon's reign offered here, hwever, suggests that his success in dealing with conquered Babylonia lay in his masterful use of non-violent tools of government: public works programs, royal public appearnces, and especially the use of documents which presented different images of the king and his policies to different national audiences. Traces of these techniques in the policies of earlier Assyrian kings suggest that the Assyrians had long used such techniques, as well as terror, to control their empire. This study also prposes some new approaches to reading Assyrian royal inscriptions. It suggests, for example, that Assyrian building documents, although often buried in foundaitons, wer first read to contemporary audiences and were primarily designed for them. An analysis of subtle differences in Esarhaddon's Babylon inscriptions suggests that variants may be clues to the identificaiton of different intended audiences for texts which were once thought of as duplicates. This book combines documentary and archeological evidence to propose a new interpretation of Esarhaddon's reign based onc lose reading of texts. it also proposes a new, more complex model of the techniques by which Assyria succeeded in governing her empire.