... exemplified the aesthetic abstractionism championed in this book, which the introduction characterizes in terms of Bertolt Brecht’s “alienation effect.” Noting that critics of the design nevertheless willfully disregarded its critical engagement with the earlier sculpture, the introduction ultimately suggests...

... the principle of abstraction that clearly informs Walker’s figural depictions, and on which abstractionism itself necessarily depends. The chapter then considers the myriad ways in which abstraction has in fact historically been deployed to black people’s detriment, whether in social, political...

...Positing that narrative coherence is the sine qua non of a literary realism that is epitomized specifically in prose, this chapter argues that it is therefore in nonrealist, experimental prose that abstractionism can register its greatest impact. It begins by demonstrating how...

...This book advocates for what it calls African American aesthetic abstractionism—a representational mode whereby an artwork, rather than striving for realist verisimilitude, vigorously asserts its essentially artificial character. It argues that while realist representation...