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In the introduction to this special issue, we argued that ambivalence is a disposition animating all criticism, even if only its disavowal, but that ambivalence becomes particularly charged in criticism…

Beauty’s Blemish: Figuring Caribbean Landscapes The environmental figures that seek to portray the Caribbean’s strange place in the world can be easily recalled and most attributed to the work of…

The audience is seated several rows deep, facing a blank gallery wall. As they wait, their chatter buzzes through the room. From an open panel at one side, Trajal Harrell…

In the first half of the last century, scores of Western artists and art historians traveled to India to have a firsthand experience of its variegated heritage of performing arts…

A Light Loose Commitment When I was a graduate student in New York, I worked as the managing editor of a feminist academic journal that focused on art and performance…

The system must be oriented to openness de novo. Peter Sloterdijk We fence our encounters in with gates. Erving Goffman Form, in the narrow sense, is nothing more than the…

This special issue doesn’t propose Ambivalent Criticism™. Instead, this issue forwards essays that reflect on a style in which we already do criticism — a style we are calling ambivalent…