The Devil's rope : a cultural history of barbed wire / Alan Krell.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Krell, Alan, 1949-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Arts, Modern--20th century.

Arts, Modern.

Barbed wire.

Physical Description:

223 pages : illustrations (some color) ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

London : Reaktion, 2002.

Summary:

A powerful and sometimes disturbing history of barbed wire, with many unusual and striking images. While barbed wire has always cut across property, war and politics as a tool of control, it has other histories, constructed through image and text in the arts, media and popular culture, which have never before been examined. Invented in France in 1860 and welcomed by the frontier farmers of America, the menacing qualities of barbed wire became evident in the Boer War, the barbed wire no-man's-land of World War I, and the Nazi concentration camps of World War II. Barbed wire became synonymous with repression. In the art of the late-twentieth century, its sambivalent character has made barbed wire the perfect symbol of post-modernity. Alan Krell's amazing story investigates the place barbed wire holds in the social imagination.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 201-209) and index.

ISBN:

186189144X

OCLC:

50494711