Pissing Figures 12802014 (ekphrasis)

JeanClaude Lebensztejns history of the urinating figure in art, Pissing Figures 12802014, is at once a scholarly inquiry into an important visual motif, and a ribald statement on transgression and limits in works of art in general. Lebensztejn is one of Frances bestkept secrets. A worldclass art historian who has lectured and taught at major universities in the United States, his work has remained almost entirely in French, his American audience limited to a small but dedicated group of cognoscenti.First introducing the Manneken Pisthe iconic little boy whose stream of urine supplies water to this famous fountain and is also the logo for a Belgian beer companythe author takes the reader through a semiscatological maze of cultural history. The earliest example is a fresco scene located directly above Cimabues Crucifixion from around 1280 at the Basilica of Saint Francis of Assisi, in which Lebensztejns careful eye locates an angel behind a pillar who looks like he is about to urinate through a hole in his garment. He continues to navigate expertly through cultural twists and turns, stopping to discuss Pier Paolo Pasolinis 1968 film Teorema, for example, and Marlene Dumass 19961997 homage to Rembrandts pissing woman. At every moment, Lebensztejns prose is lively, his thinking dynamic, and his subject matter entertaining.In this short and poignant cultural history, readers not only find the care for detail that has made Lebensztejn into one of the greatest European art historians, but also the rebelliousness that makes him one of the most interesting intellectuals of our time. The first widely distributed book of Lebensztejns in English, Pissing Figures 12802014 is simultaneously published in France by ditions Macula.