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Description
This book focuses on an artistic tactic from the late Soviet underground called “shimmering,” characterized by rapid shifts between various opposing perspectives and ideologies, with the artist embracing all and betraying all in turn.
The Moscow Conceptualists designed shimmering to avoid repeating what they saw as the fatal flaw of the Soviet avant-garde: the collusion between artistic and political authority. Shimmering was intended to prevent artists from ever slipping into authoritarianism, making their words, works and selves slippery instead. Inspired by American Pop Art's nonchalant critique of the hegemonic visuality of capitalism, Moscow Conceptualists forged shimmering to similarly represent Soviet official culture. Daniil Leiderman traces how shimmering developed from experiments with painterly space exploring the contentious legacy of the Soviet avant-garde, to re-negotiations of the artist's relationship to their own authority, ultimately becoming a model for constructing new social collectives, outside the norms of Soviet society. The author argues that shimmering remains an important tactic for dismantling hierarchical power in contemporary Russian protest art.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1: The Origins of Shimmering
Chapter 2: The Shimmering Sacred
Chapter 3: Shimmering Space
Chapter 4: Shimmering Object
Chapter 5: Author, Audience, and the Politics of Shimmering
Conclusion: Shimmering in the Time of Putin
Appendix: List of Interviews Conducted by the Author
Bibliography
About the Author
Index
Product details
| Published | Dec 10 2026 |
|---|---|
| Format | Hardback |
| Edition | 1st |
| Pages | 256 |
| ISBN | 9781666923278 |
| Imprint | Bloomsbury Academic |
| Illustrations | 30 b/w photos |
| Dimensions | 229 x 152 mm |
| Publisher | Bloomsbury Publishing |
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