Post-ExceptionalismArt After Political Theology

Brings together the philosophy of art and aesthetics with debates about political theology and sovereignty

• Develops a critique of aesthetic exceptionalism and proposes a new theory of post-exceptionalism
• Reconsiders postmodern commonplaces such as the copy, the fake, and the forgery outside of the limits of aesthetics, within the framework of political philosophy
• Breaks out of art history’s Eurocentrism and works between Western and Chinese philosophy, practicing an anti-orientalist method
• Offers highly original, in-depth readings of key contemporary texts in philosophy, political theory, and art theory
• Includes nuanced readings of works of art from both the Western and Chinese traditions

Postmodernism has come and gone, but the belief that artists and works of art are exceptional is alive and well. Post-Exceptionalism speculates that this is so because postmodernism, when it declared the death of the author and celebrated the copy, failed to name political theology as its fundamental target. In a time when sovereignty is experiencing a dubious global revival, the moment has come to reconsider the artist and the work of art after political theology in search for a new, worldly, and emancipatory politics of aesthetics.